CAPE Holland, a leading supplier of innovative foundation installation equipment for the offshore industry, has been awarded a contract by installation contractor Boskalis for the delivery of a CAPE VLT-640 Triple spread. The CAPE Vibro Lifting Technology will be used to upend and safely install monopiles through the soil layers at risk of pile run for the Moray West offshore wind turbine and Offshore Substation Platform foundations. The piles will subsequently be driven to final penetration with an impact hammer. The monopiles have a top diameter of 7.5 meter and bottom diameter of up to 10 meter, measure up to 93 meters in length and weigh up to nearly 2,000 tons. The Vibro Lifting Technology mitigates possible pile runs and is much more quiet compared to pile driving with an impact hammer.
The CAPE VLT-640 Triple, with an eccentric moment of nearly 2,000 kgm, has a safe working load of 2,200 tons and the spread includes hydraulic power units and a control cabin. Boskalis will perform the installation of the XXL monopiles using the CAPE VLT-640 Triple, which is scheduled for mobilization in the second half of 2023. Boskalis will deploy its DP2 Heavy Lift Vessel Bokalift 2 with its 4,000 tons crane capacity and large cargo deck of 7,500 m2 for the installation campaign.
“We are thrilled to partner with Boskalis on this important project,” said Dick van Wijngaarden, Business Development Manager at CAPE Holland. “Our CAPE Vibro Lifting Technology is the only solution to prevent pile run 100% and provide a fully controllable installation process of large monopiles, and we are confident that it will help to make this project a success.”
Frodo Leenhouts, Project manager Offshore Heavy Lifting at Boskalis commented, “We are pleased to work with CAPE Holland on this project. We are confident that the CAPE VLT-640 Triple will help us to efficiently and safely install the monopiles for the Moray West offshore wind farm.”
The Moray West offshore wind farm is located off the east coast of Scotland in the Moray Firth. The 882 MW wind farm will have the capacity to power up to 1.3 million homes in the United Kingdom. The development consists of 60 offshore wind turbines and two substations, all fixed on monopile foundations.
Due to the large turbine size (14.7 megawatts) and water depth (up to 54 meters), extremely large XXL monopiles weighing up to 2,000 tons each will be required for this development.