Geotechnical Survey to Begin at North Irish Sea Array Site

A geotechnical site investigation campaign is set to begin at the proposed North Irish Sea Array (NISA) wind farm area offshore Ireland.

The campaign will involve the deployment of seabed borehole drilling and Cone Penetration Test (CPT) equipment from a survey vessel at specific locations within the NISA offshore wind farm area.

The geotechnical survey, expected to be completed between 17 October and 20 November, subject to weather and operational constraints, will be conducted by the Fugro Synergy survey vessel.

The site investigation will utilise CPT and continuous sampling boreholes and the work will be conducted during 24-hour operations.

The North Irish Sea Array project site covers around 226.9 square kilometres in the Irish Sea and is located between seven and 17 kilometres off the coast of the Dublin, Meath, and Louth counties.

The project’s owner, Statkraft, recently appointed COWI as the Owner’s Engineer to help the company in preparing an auction application for the first offshore competition under the Renewable Electricity Support Scheme (ORESS-1) in Ireland.

NISA is one of the seven projects the Irish Government invited to apply for Maritime Area Consent (MAC) in March 2022.

If approved, the offshore wind farm could play an important role in helping Ireland meet its ambitions of reaching 80 per cent of renewable energy by 2030. Once fully operational, the project will have the capacity to power over 500,000 homes with clean energy, according to the developer.

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