BALTIC 2 WIND FARM

BALTIC 2 WIND FARM

The Baltic 2 wind farm is to be constructed in for EnBW Erneuerbare Energien by a joint venture between Hoctief Construction and the DEME Group in the German Sector of the Baltic Sea 32km north of Rugen Island. The farm will consist of 80 Siemens 3.6MW wind turbines installed on a combination of mono piles and jacket foundations in water depths varying from 20m to 40m construction is planned to commence in 2012.

In order to design the turbines piled foundations it was necessary to carry out test piling at the site, which involved the pitching and driving of steel tubular steel piles into the seabed at predetermined positions. The piles are then re struck whilst acoustically monitored to assess the ground conditions.

The NORFOLK SWIFT was contracted through Seacontractors of Vlissingan to provide crew transfer and logistical support for the 2011 program of restrikes on the piles. The vessel was mobilized from Ramsgate Harbour transiting through the Kiel Canal and on to Sassnitz Harbour the base port for the project.

During the restrike program the NORFOLK SWIFT was utilized frequently to transport, crew, engineers and auditors to and from the sheerlegs barge GPS Apollo together with spare parts and data packages. During the period between restrikes Hoctief utilized the vessel to carry out a crew change to their jack up barge Odin which was carrying out another geotechnical investigation.

On the completion of the Baltic 2 foundation works a multibeam scour survey was carried out at each of the pile locations from the vessel.