SAL Heavy Lift has won a contract from the Dutch offshore construction company Van Oord to deliver cargo for the foundation and supports of the Walney offshore wind project being developed in the Irish Sea.
The carrier’s heavy-lift vessel Svenja has been chartered for 30 voyages to Belfast for the movement of 87 monopiles from Rostock, Germany, and 47 transition pieces from Aalborg, Denmark, and Teesside, United Kingdom.
The monopiles form the foundation of the offshore windmills, and will be up to 8.4 (27.5 feet) meters in diameter and weigh up to 970 tons each. The transition pieces, which will be installed atop the monopiles, are up to 30 meters long and up to 7 feet in diameter, and weigh up to 579 tons.
The Walney offshore wind farm is being developed about 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) off Cumbria, United Kingdom, in an area with tidal fluctuations of up to eight meters. The project is being built in two parts and will have a total of 102 Siemens-built turbines with total generating capacity of 367 megawatts.
This is the second large contract that Hamburg-based SAL has signed for offshore support this year. SAL’s Trina recently completed delivery of components for the Veja Mate project off Germany’s North Sea coast.
For that project, SAL carried 67 transition pieces weighing 365 tons each and measuring 22 by six meters, along with airtight platforms and anode cages.
SAL, based in Hamburg, is part of the “K” Line Group. The carrier has 13 heavy-lift ships with speeds as fast as 20 knots, unobstructed deck space of up to 3,500 square meters, and combined crane capacities of 550 to 2,200 tons per ship.
