UK offshore engineering consultancy SLPE has been awarded the foundation detailed design contract for Red Rock Power and ESB’s 1100MW Inch Cape wind farm off Scotland.
SLPE delivered the foundation concept design for Inch Cape in March this year and, following a period of further design optimisation, has been awarded the detailed design work that is planned to start in early 2022.
Inch Cape successfully applied earlier this year to remove the capacity cap from its consent, allowing it to select the most powerful turbines on the market.
The wind farm will be located 15-22 km off the Angus coast in water depths ranging from 43 metres to 55 metres.
SLPE managing director Joseph Hilton said: “We are delighted to be continuing our work for Inch Cape.
“Following the concept design phase, we undertook a refinement phase to further optimise our designs for a number of variables and uncertainties.
“These studies will contribute to the detailed design of monopiles that will support some of the largest offshore wind turbines in the market today.
“Inch Cape is also currently the deepest offshore wind farm in which monopile foundations are planned to be deployed”.
In the meantime, SLPE is supporting Inch Cape with further concept refinement work and site investigation support, in order to inform project decisions and develop design inputs in preparation for detailed design.
SLPE head of turbine substructures Nick Terry said: “With water depths of up to 55 metres, the monopiles for Inch Cape will be among the largest in the world.
“Being able to demonstrate the feasibility of monopiles in these water depths has delivered significant cost savings to the project, when compared against jacket foundations.
“This has been made possible by our in-house iterative design and optimisation software, which enables each location-specific monopile design to be individually optimised for both structural weight and cost-effective fabrication.
“Our monopile designs also incorporate advanced PISA-type geotechnical design, using full 3D finite element analysis and advanced soil constitutive modelling to simulate the soil-structure behaviour.
“This results in higher accuracy and considerable weight savings compared to conventional pile design methods.
“This advanced approach is delivered in partnership with Geowynd, who complement SLPE with their deep expertise in marine geotechnics.”
Inch Cape project director Adam Ezzamel said: “We are looking forward to progressing into the next phase of design with SLPE, and are actively seeking similarly innovative and ambitious UK-based companies to support us with the delivery of this exciting project.”