Last week, at the Smulders’ facility in Hoboken, Belgium, the joint venture ENGIE Solutions – Iemants (subsidiary of Smulders) started the cutting of the first steel for the topside of TenneT’s offshore transformer station for the Hollandse Kust (west Alpha) wind farm zone.
Last week, the joint venture partners and TenneT officially kicked off the steel fabrication for the Hollandse Kust (west Alpha) topside. The pieces that were cut (nodes and plate girders) are the first building blocks for the topside. Steel fabrication will now continue at the Smulders’ facilities in Arendonk, Balen and Hoboken.
Second Dutch transformer built by ENGIE/Iemants
The joint venture was awarded the contract for the Hollandse Kust (west Alpha) in November 2020. The scope of work includes the engineering, procurement, construction, offshore installation, connection and testing of the offshore transformer substation. Its is the second Dutch offshore transformer station to be built by the ENGIE Solutions/Iemants combination. Earlier that year, the joint venture was already awarded a similar contract for the Hollandse Kust (noord) station, of which the assembly is currently ongoing on the ENGIE Solutions’ yard in Hoboken, Belgium.
Hans Schipper, JV Project Manager ENGIE Solutions – Iemants: “With the cutting of the first steel, an important project milestone has been achieved on time. We are confident that also on this project we will meet the jointly established project goals and continue the excellent cooperation with the teams of TenneT, its Suppliers of materials and the Certifying Authority.
Commissioning planned for Q3 2023
The joint venture started the design works for the topside, jacket and piles after the contract award. Assembly of the topside will start at the Smulders’ facilities in July 2021 after which the topside deck sections will be transferred to the ENGIE Solutions yard in Hoboken for installation of all the auxiliary systems and the integration of the free issued medium & high voltage equipment starting in the fourth quarter of 2021. The final outfitting, commissioning and testing will take place from March 2022 until sail away in the summer of 2023, after which the topside will be installed offshore.
The jacket fabrication will start shortly. Offshore installation of the jacket will take place in the summer of 2022. The 700 MW transformer substation for Hollandse Kust (west Alpha) is scheduled to be fully offshore commissioned in the third quarter of 2023.
The Hollandse Kust (noord) and (west Alpha) are the fifth and sixth large-scale grid connections for offshore wind energy in the Netherlands to be constructed and operated by TenneT. They will be connected to the onshore transformer station in Beverwijk which is currently under construction. Source: Smulders
