First 69 Wind Turbines Installed at 759 MW Hollandse Kust Noord Offshore Wind Park

Wind Industry Experts Bat For Extending PLI For Component Makers 

The first of 69 of 11 MW wind turbines have been installed at the 759 MW Hollandse Kust Noord offshore wind park in the North Sea.

Manufacturer of wind turbines, Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy and Dutch maritime contracting firm Van Oord marked the completion of the 11 MW turbine at Hollandse Kust Noord (HKN). The turbines are in the process of installation 24/7 determined by the weather.

CrossWind, a JV between Shell and Dutch utility Eneco, will look into the development of Hollandse Kust Noord, a super-hybrid project entailing floating solar, battery storage, and green hydrogen production. Hollandse Kust Noord will generate at least 3.3 TWh every year.

“First the tower is installed on the monopile, then the nacelle on top of the tower,” said Stefan Hartman, wind turbine Generator Package Manager at CrossWind, adding, “Then come the blades, which are usually the most critical lift with respect to weather conditions. Blade installation will commence if there is a sufficiently long-time window of windspeeds below 12 m/s. For comparison, 12 m/s is a windspeed at which it becomes hard to hold an umbrella.”

The wind farm is a part of the much larger Hollandse Kust Noord project.

Innovations at Hollandse Kust Noord

Five innovations at HKN are currently under implementation by CrossWind. These include a 0.5 MW floating solar plant that will come up alongside the wind turbines. CrossWind and TNO will design, install and operate what is being touted as the world’s first offshore floating solar plant at 0.5 MW to be placed alongside the wind turbines. HKN will also boast of battery storage and hydrogen production of megawatt scale. This will facilitate the employment of electricity generated by the wind farm and solar plant when the demand is low.

With the use of real-time data, intelligent wind turbines are being installed to respond to changing conditions within seconds and maintain grid stability.