The Ormonde Wind Farm is a wind farm west of

Barrow-in-Furness Barrow-in-Furness is a port town in Cumbria, England. Historically in Lancashire, it was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1867 and merged with Dalton-in-Furness Urban District in 1974 to form the Borough of Barrow-in-Furness. In 2023 the ...

in the

Irish Sea The Irish Sea or , gv, Y Keayn Yernagh, sco, Erse Sie, gd, Muir Èireann , Ulster-Scots: ''Airish Sea'', cy, Môr Iwerddon . is an extensive body of water that separates the islands of Ireland and Great Britain. It is linked to the Ce ...

. The wind farm covers an area of . It has a total capacity of 150 MW and is expected to produce around 500 GWh of electricity per year.

Planning

Originally the Ormonde project was planned as a hybrid wind and natural gas powered electricity generation plant supplied from the Ormonde South and Ormonde North gas fields. The project was developed by Eclipse Energy. In 2008, Vattenfall bought Eclipse Energy and the project was developed as wind energy only. The project management company throughout the project has been Offshore Design Engineering.

Construction

Construction started in 2010 and was completed in August 2011. Prysmian provided submarine power cable connections including 27 km of 33 kV inter-array cables to connect the wind turbines and a 42 km of 132 kV export cable to connect the wind farm to the substation. 30 turbines each with 5 MW nameplate capacity are provided by

REpower Senvion S.A. (called REpower Systems SE until 2014) was a German wind turbine manufacturer founded in 2001 in Germany, majority owned by a private equity firm. Senvion as REpower Systems, as it was initially called, was established in 2001 th ...

and electrical works were to be carried out by Areva. Steel foundations for generators were developed and designed by OWEC Tower and produced by Burntisland Fabrications. Logistics and assembly services are provided by

Harland and Wolff Harland & Wolff is a British shipbuilding company based in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It specialises in ship repair, shipbuilding and offshore construction. Harland & Wolff is famous for having built the majority of the ocean liners for the W ...

. Generators were installed by

A2SEA A2SEA was an offshore wind farm installation and services company based in Fredericia, Denmark. The company specializes in transport, installation, and servicing of offshore wind farms. In addition to Denmark, the company has subsidiaries in th ...

. The first four steel foundations were delivered in July 2010, and were installed by a joint venture of Scaldis and Geosea BV. The wind farm was commissioned on 22 February 2012 and is now fully operational. Its

levelised cost The levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), or levelized cost of energy, is a measure of the average net present cost of electricity generation for a generator over its lifetime. It is used for investment planning and to compare different methods ...

has been estimated at £149/MWh.

Incident

In 2021, a rotor and blades from a wind turbine fell into the sea following a maintenance error. The components broke up and debris has been washed up on nearby beaches.

References

External links

Ormonde Wind Farm (Vattenfall's website)

LORC Knowledge - Datasheet for Ormonde Wind Farm

Ormonde Wind Farm - Jacket Installation

BBC - Three steps to build a wind farmFoundocean Project references
{{Wind power in the United Kingdom Offshore wind farms in the Irish Sea Wind farms in England Vattenfall wind farms Buildings and structures in Barrow-in-Furness Energy infrastructure completed in 2012 2012 establishments in England

Planning

Construction

Incident

See also

References

External links