Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V. (Boskalis) has been awarded the offshore export cable installation contract for the Hornsea 2 offshore wind farm. The contract with a value greater than EUR 100 million was awarded by Ørsted Wind Power A/S and consists of three export cable circuits with a total length of approximately 380 kilometers.
The project scope includes the preparation of the offshore export cable route (geophysical survey, boulder clearance and seabed leveling through dredging), and the installation and protection of the cables. The three 130 kilometer long export cables will connect the offshore substation to the onshore substation by means of a 300 meter long horizontal directional drilling, crossing the sea defense of Horseshoe Point, UK. The project is expected to commence later this year with a planned completion late 2021.
Boskalis aims to maximize UK local content for its scope of work.
Boskalis will deploy a wide variety of its in-house specialist services and assets including a trailing suction hopper dredger, a geophysical survey vessel and multiple cable-laying vessels. Furthermore, Boskalis has invested in a new multi-mode plough for both the pre-lay trenching and backfilling. The plough can withstand 200 tons continuous pull, is capable of trenching at various depths and in a wide range of soil circumstances and was designed to minimize the environmental impact. The plough will be pulled by the recently added high-end construction vessel Boka Falcon.
The Hornsea 2 offshore wind farm will consist of up to 165 turbines with a maximum capacity of 1.4GW and is located approximately 90 kilometers off the Yorkshire coast. When complete, it will be able to serve the needs of up to 1.6 million homes with clean electricity.
Boskalis’ strategy is aimed at benefitting from key macro-economic factors which drive worldwide demand in our markets: expansion of the global economy, increase in energy consumption, global population growth and the challenges that go hand in hand with climate change. This project is related to the development of generating renewable energy due to climate change and increasing energy consumption.