Van Oord offshore installation vessel Aeolus is starting the installation of the first of 62 jacket foundations for the 496MW Saint-Brieuc offshore wind farm off France.
The vessel has been upgraded and a spread of project-specific installation equipment placed on deck ahead of installation of the first pin-piles for the foundations.
A total of 190 pin piles will be installed, three for each turbine jacket and four for the offshore substation foundation, Van Oord said.
Equipment was engineered, constructed and extensively tested to ensure perfect execution of the project fefore the start of the operations in France, the company said.
It added that because of the geotechnical circumstances in the Bay of Saint-Brieuc, harsh weather conditions combined with extremely strong currents, heavy Atlantic swell and high waves, offshore operations are possible only between March and October.
To ensure that the Aeolus is safely jacked up above sea level the lifting spuds were modified with a flex-pin construction.
For the drilling operations, new hydraulic drills were engineered and built to handle all types of soil and rock conditions.
A newly designed and created state-of-the-art drilling template will function as a positioning and holding-tool to ensure the precise placement of the pin-piles, Van Oord said.
Van Oord will also be deploying several other vessels on the project in the next months for the removal of boulders, installation of scour protection and transport of pin piles.
The installation campaign for the pin piles will be executed in 2021 and 2022. In 2022 the jackets will be installed.
Van Oord is using the port of Cherbourg as the pin pile marshalling port.
The pin piles, which are coming from Spain, will be stored in France before installation offshore.