Ørsted has installed the first 11 MW offshore wind turbine at Borkum Riffgrund 3 project, set to be the largest offshore wind farm in Germany upon completion.
Borkum Riffgrund 3’s first wind turbine was installed by the installation vessel Seaway Ventus from Seaway7.
The installation will also be carried out in equal parts by Wind Osprey from Cadeler.
A total of 83 Siemens Gamesa wind turbines, each with a rated capacity of 11 MW, will be installed at Borkum Riffgrund 3, which will have 913 MW capacity.
The offshore wind farm is located approximately 72 km off the coast of Lower Saxony in Germany and covers an area of around 75 square kilometers.
The project is also the first offshore wind farm to be awarded without subsidies in the world. This has primarily been made possible by several long-term corporate power purchase agreements (CPPA), which Ørsted has signed with industrial and technology customers.
Once the offshore wind farm has been commissioned in 2025, an offtake agreements totalling 786 MW have been entered into with Amazon (350 MW), BASF (186 MW), Covestro (100 MW), Energie-Handels-Gesellschaft/REWE Group (100 MW), and Google (50 MW). The contracts range from 10 to 25 years. The agreements create long-term price security both for Ørsted as project developer and for the customers.
Borkum Riffgrund 3 is jointly owned by Ørsted and Nuveen Infrastructure.
This milestone for Borkum Riffgrund 3 follows shortly after the successful delivery of first power from the 253 MW Gode Wind 3 Offshore Wind Farm, which Ørsted and Nuveen Infrastructure are constructing simultaneously with Borkum Riffgrund 3.
Together, the two offshore wind farms will close to double Ørsted’s total installed capacity in Germany and make an important contribution to Germany’s green transformation.
Borkum Riffgrund 3 is the first offshore wind farm to be built by Ørsted in Germany without an offshore substation (OSS). The new connection concept provides for a direct connection of the wind turbines via 66 kV connection cables to the DolWin epsilon offshore converter platform operated by the German transmission system operator, TenneT.
“Borkum Riffgrund 3 is an icebreaker in offshore wind. It was the first offshore wind project in the world to be awarded on a merchant basis, and it’s the first offshore wind farm in Germany to break the 900 MW-mark. I’m proud to see that the first turbine is now installed, and we look forward to completing this milestone project,” said Peter Obling, Head of Continental Europe at Ørsted.
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