RWE, HSM Offshore Energy begin construction for Denmark’s “largest” offshore wind project

(WO) – Towards the end of November, the construction of the THOR Offshore High Voltage Station (OHVS) project for RWE officially started. The key-milestone steel-cutting ceremony took place at the HSM Offshore Energy yard in Schiedam (Netherlands). Both structures, the offshore substation and the jacket, are built here.

HSM Offshore Energy, together with its key subcontractors Iv-Offshore & Energy and GE Renewable Energy, won an engineering, procurement, construction, installation and commissioning contract for the offshore high voltage substation and its jacket foundation in 2022. The selection was based on HSM Offshore Energy’s experience and technical know-how to create a highly efficient design for the offshore substation and the jacket foundation for RWE’s Thor offshore wind farm.

The open design of the substation, which will have a capacity of more than 1,000 megawatts (MW) and overall weight below 3000MT is a gamechanger in the offshore wind market, offering the best AC power / weight ratio in industry history. This reduces the use of structural steel and the energy needed during manufacturing – with steel sourcing and fabrication in Europe.

THOR offshore wind farm. RWE will build the THOR offshore wind farm off the Danish west coast – approximately 22 km from Thorsminde on the west coast of Jutland.

To connect the wind farm to the Danish grid, RWE will build two new substations – one at sea and one on land. The substation at sea is the nerve center of the wind farm. The electricity produced by the individual wind turbines is collected here and transformed to transmission-level voltage.

The green electricity will be transported through export cables to the new-build onshore substation. THOR will be Denmark’s largest offshore wind farm to date and will be capable of producing enough green electricity to supply the equivalent of more than one million Danish households.