France’s Only Floating Wind Turbine Hits Near 60 Per Cent Continuous Capacity Factor

The 2 MW Floatgen demonstrator floating wind turbine has shown a capacity factor of nearly 60 per cent over the last three months and a production of 25 GWh since its commissioning offshore France in 2018, BW Ideol said.

France’s first and only floating wind turbine delivered an average capacity factor of 59.2 per cent over a three-month period ranging from November 2022 to January 2023.

The 25 GWh-milestone was reached just after the major Atlantic storm Gerard in late January.

The Floatgen turbine, mounted on BW Ideol’s patented Damping Pool® foundation, handled wind speeds up to 37.30 metres per second, equivalent to 134 km/h, and up to 5.5 metres of significant wave height, equivalent to around 10.5 meters maximum wave height, BW Ideol said.

”Floatgen – one of the few floating wind turbines currently in operation across the globe – continues to deliver outstanding results in terms of reliability, efficiency and production. It keeps on validating the merits of our unique floating offshore wind technology, even in the harshest environments. Such repeated performance, high availability and consequently high capacity factor underlines the benefits of floating wind and its ability to capture the best possible wind resources without depth constraints, contributing to a much needed energy resilience in the process,” said Paul de la Guérivière, the CEO of BW Ideol.

The 2 MW demonstrator is equipped with the world’s first concrete hull for floating offshore wind. It is operating in 33 metres water depth off the coast of Le Croisic, providing electricity to approximately 3,000 households.

This full-scale prototype is owned, operated and maintained by BW Ideol, generates amounts of valuable operational data and enables BW Ideol’s teams to develop an industry-leading hands-on expertise and track-record in terms of floating offshore wind O&M. This asset also serves as a full-scale and real-conditions R&D platform to qualify new components and methods as well as perform environmental impact studies.

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