Ireland launches RFEOI for offshore wind farms

Electricity Supply Board (ESB)​, Ireland’s state owned electricity company is seeking expressions of interest for the development of a pipeline of offshore wind projects ranging between 200 MW and 500 MW. The location of these initial offshore wind farms is expected to be in the Irish sea.

ESB plans to develop or acquire the offshore wind farms commencing in 2018, through a pipeline of projects which are currently going through the consenting process.

The high level scope of services includes offshore geophysical surveys; geotechnical investigation and sampling, marine archaeological survey; sourcing and deploying of floating Lidar wind measurement buoys; desktop UXO risk assessment and report; site characterisation assessment; ground model development; complete factual and interpretive reporting; and risk assessments and method statements development.

Some post construction services during the Wind Farm operational phase may also be included in the scope of this framework.

The deadline for the submission of the EOI documents is October 2 before 16:00 (Local time).

You can have further information in our business opportunities section.

As we reported in mid August, Office of Gas and Electricity Markets (OFGEM), the government regulator for gas and electricity markets in UK, announced it will start tender for Round 5 of Offshore Transmission Owner (OFTO).

The five projects were:

• Walney Extension Offshore Wind Farm, contains two phases: WOW03 and WOW04. For the purposes of TR5, both phases will be treated as a single Qualifying Project and one licence will be awarded to an OFTO to operate the Walney Extension. It is located approximately 19km from shore in the Irish Sea and connects to Heysham and it is100% indirectly owned by DONG Energy.
• Dudgeon Offshore Wind Farm, with a capacity of 402 MW, consisting of 67 Siemens 6MW wind turbines. It is located 32km off the coast of Cromer in North Norfolk and it is owned by affiliates of Statoil ASA, Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company PJSC (“Masdar”), and Statkraft AS.
• Galloper Wind Farm comprises of 56 Siemens SWT-6.0-154 Wind Turbine Generators (WTGs), with a capacity of up to 340MW. It is located 27km off the east coast of England and is adjacent to the Greater Gabbard project. The onshore connection point is at Sizewell, near Leiston. The farm is equally owned by RWE, Siemens Financial Services, UK Green Investment Bank and Macquarie Capital, who each have a 25% share in the company.
• Race Bank Offshore Wind Farm consists of 91 6.3MW turbines and an overall capacity of 565 MW. It is located in the North Sea, 27km north of Blakeney point off the coast of Norfolk, and 28kms east of Chapel St. Leonards off the coast of Lincolnshire. The transmission assets will connect at the Wapole 400kV substation near King’s Lynn. The farm is 100% indirectly owned by DONG Energy.
• Rampion Offshore Wind Farm consist of 116 Vestas 3.45MW turbines, with a maximum total generating capacity of 400.2MW. It is located approximately 13km off the south coast of England, near Sussex. The site covers an area of approximately 78km2 and is situated in water depths of 19-40m. The farm is jointly owned by EON (50.1%), Enbridge (24.9%) and Green Investment Bank (25%).

We have lately informed about other offshore wind projects in UK:

• 336 MW Galloper offshore wind farm project
• 660 MW Walney Extension wind farm in Cumbria
• 588 MW Beatrice offshore wind farm
• 1.2 GW Dogger Bank Teesside B offshore wind farm on the North Sea
• 1.2 GW Dogger Bank Teesside A offshore wind farm on the North Sea
• 90 Mw Burbo Bank offshore wind farm
• 400 MW Rampion offshore wind farm