Siemens installs two offshore platforms in North Sea for TenneT

Siemens has completed installation of a fourth offshore platform in the North Sea, marking a step ahead for grid connections of sea-based wind farms.

Prior to the installation of the platform for the SylWin1 DC link, Siemens installed the third platform at sea for the HelWin2 grid connection.

Siemens is under a contract to implement five North Sea grid connection projects for TenneT.

The first four grid connections are due to take up commercial operation successively between the second half of 2014 and the first half of 2015 while the fifth grid connection is expected to go on-line in 2019.

Siemens Power Transmission and Smart Grid Divisions CEO Jan Mrosik said: "We have now erected four high-tech platforms for TenneT in the North Sea.

"We succeeded in completing the first installation last year and erected the other three platforms in quick succession this year – an ambitious task as far as technology and logistics go.

"Once they have been commissioned, these grid connections will supply electricity from offshore wind power for around three million households."

Located 70km to the west of the island Sylt, newly installed 864MW SylWin1 platform will concentrate the wind power produced by the three North Sea wind farms Dan Tysk, Butendiek and Sandbank and transmit the electricity to land.

TenneT Germany offshore director Wilfried Breuer said: "In the past few days, we have erected two platforms in quick succession that will provide approximately 1.5 gigawatts of additional capacity for feeding offshore wind energy into the onshore transmission grid.

"The German government has decided to increase the transmission capacity for offshore wind energy by 6.5 gigawatts in the period until 2020. In 2015, two-thirds of that target will already have been achieved."

---

Image: The SylWin1 platform with a capacity of 864MW. Photo: © Siemens AG.