Ørsted Reaches Offshore Milestone, Installs 1500th Turbine

Ørsted has reached another milestone in its expanding offshore wind business with the installation of wind turbine 1,500 at the Borssele 1 & 2 project

Global offshore wind major – Ørsted has announced that it has reached another milestone in its expanding offshore wind business with the installation of offshore wind turbine 1,500. The firm claims that it is set to more than double its offshore wind capacity in the coming five years using ever-larger turbines.

When the firm recently installed the 25th of Borssele 1 & 2’s 8MW wind turbines, it was also the 1,500th offshore wind turbine installed by Ørsted. Becoming the first offshore wind developer to reach this significant milestone.

Before construction start at Borssele 1 & 2, the firm had already installed 6.8 GW offshore wind capacity globally, which annually supplies green electricity for the equivalent of 6.6 million households. It is currently constructing 3GW of offshore wind and aims to have installed a total of 15 GW by 2025 in Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Taiwan, UK and the US.

Anders Lindberg, Executive Vice President, Offshore EPC & QHSE, said offshore wind has matured at a rapid pace and can now be considered a cornerstone in the green transformation of many places in the world.

“The 1,500 offshore wind turbines installed by Ørsted will contribute significantly to a greener future, but there’s no doubt that the potential of offshore wind reaches far beyond that. Today, offshore wind power is not only a clean but also a cost-competitive alternative to power generated by the burning of fossil fuels.”

In 2019, the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated that offshore wind power, even if only confined to windy regions within 60km from shore, has the potential to globally generate up to 36,000 terawatt-hours of renewable electricity per year. That would outstrip the current global electricity demand of 23,000 terawatt-hours. The IEA also concluded that offshore wind power could become the largest source of electricity generation in Europe by 2040. According to European Commission scenarios, Europe will need 450 GW of offshore wind power to reach zero emissions by 2050. This is roughly 20 times more offshore wind power than has been installed today.

The firm also installed the world’s first offshore wind turbine at Vindeby, Denmark, in 1991. The entire offshore wind farm, consisting of 11 turbines, had a capacity of 5MW – a lot less than the capacity of a single modern offshore wind turbine. In 2012, 21 years after Vindeby, Ørsted installed its 500th turbine, which was achieved at Walney Offshore Wind Farm in the UK. The 1,000th followed only four years later at the German Gode Wind 1 & 2 project.