OFFSHORE WIND
Technically, larger turbines have no restrictions.
Photo courtesy of GE Renewable Energy.
Optimising revenues The world’s first offshore wind farm was commissioned in 1991. This Vindeby Offshore project, created by a group of Danish developers, consisted of eleven turbines that together generated 5MW. More than three decades later, a lot has changed.
T
he first offshore wind farms were constructed using technology with only slight adaptations compared to onshore wind turbines. In time, the turbines were designed, specifically for the harsh circumstances at sea. Also, at sea with no noise restrictions and plenty of room, operators started to look for larger turbines to reduce the cost of offshore power generation. At the beginning of the new century, the first 2MW offshore wind turbines were installed and increasingly more countries started to develop plans for the construction of offshore wind farms in order to reach their sustainability goals. Together with these plans, the industry
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continuously invested in further improving the efficiency and effectivity of the offshore turbines, resulting in turbines growing both in size as in power generation.
Three decades later, a lot has changed.
A handful In Europe, currently the largest market except for China, the market for offshore turbines only knows a handful of companies that develop and produce offshore wind turbine generators. In the last few years, they together succeeded in further improving the power generation of offshore wind turbines. In February 2018, GE Renewable Energy announced their Haliade-X platform
Image courtesy of Oneworld.nl.
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