Following an exclusivity agreement awarded by Danish energy group Ørsted in February of this year, Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy has confirmed that it will provide 165 of its SG 8.0-167 DD wind turbines to the 1,386 megawatt (MW) Hornsea Project Two offshore wind farm.
The farm is set to be built in the Hornsea Offshore Wind Zone located off the west coast of England.
As is the nature with multi-million dollar contracts in the renewable energy industry, companies can sometimes — in their over-eager desire to highlight every new and important agreement — provide what seems like duplicate information to previous announcements.
This week, for example, Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy (SGRE) has announced that it will supply 165 of its SG 8.0-167 DD wind turbines to the 1,386 MW Hornsea Project Two offshore wind farm being developed by Danish energy group Ørsted. This is somewhat confusing, considering that the two companies made what appears to be the same announcement in February of this year — a story we covered at the time.
It would appear, however, that the devil is again in the details, and that February’s announcement was of an ‘exclusivity’ agreement between the two companies and this week’s announcement is the ‘official signing of the wind turbine order.’
This wind turbine order goes down in history as the largest wind project in Siemens Gamesa’s history, but also the largest single wind turbine order in the history of the offshore wind energy sector — a position held by the 1,218 MW Hornsea Project One offshore wind farm, which signed an agreement with Siemens for 7 MW wind turbines. Thus, Siemens Gamesa has surpassed its own progenitor.
SGRE wind turbines. As already noted, the nacelles for the fleet of Hornsea Project Two turbines will be produced at the company’s Cuxhaven factory in Germany, while the majority of the blades will be made at its Hull factory in the UK, where pre-assembly will also be carried out. The wind turbine towers are expected to be sourced from local UK suppliers, ensuring that a majority of the project’s manufacturing work will be based in the country paying for the project.
The entire Hornsea Offshore Wind Zone is now one large Ørsted project, after confirming it would build the 1,218 MW Hornsea Project One offshore wind farm in February of 2016, after nearly a year earlier acquiring the rights to build Hornsea Projects Two and Three. Construction on Hornsea Project One began in late January, with the installation of the first of 174 monopiles (right). Hornsea Project Two is now expected to begin construction in 2021, while Hornsea Project Three submitted an application for a Development Consent Order (DCO) on 14th May 2018 and is still a while away.
