First Steel in Water at Ørsted and Eversource’s Two-State Offshore Wind Project

May 16, 2024, by Adnan Memija

Ørsted and Eversource’s Revolution Wind offshore wind farm has achieved its “steel in the water” milestone with the installation of the project’s first turbine foundation offshore the US.

Located approximately 15 miles (about 24 kilometres) south of the Rhode Island coast and 32 miles (approximately 51 kilometres) southeast of the Connecticut coast, Revolution Wind is adjacent to Ørsted and Eversource’s South Fork Wind, America’s first utility-scale offshore wind farm.

The first steel was achieved for the Revolution Wind project with the installation of the first of 65 foundations that will hold the Siemens Gamesa 11 MW wind turbines.

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Ørsted and Eversource awarded Boskalis a contract for the foundation and offshore substations transportation and installation work. The company’s vessel Bokalift 2 is currently at the offshore site, according to the latest AIS data available online.

“America’s offshore wind industry is scaling up, and the first steel in the water at Revolution Wind is a tremendous milestone for Rhode Island and Connecticut’s clean energy journey,” said David Hardy, Group EVP and CEO Americas at Ørsted.

“We’re building on our successful track record with the Block Island Wind Farm and South Fork Wind, and Revolution Wind can generate more than four times as much power as those two projects put together, demonstrating the enormous economic opportunity of offshore wind.”

The 704 MW Revolution Wind is the country’s first multi-state offshore wind project.

The developers received approval of the project’s Construction and Operations Plan (COP) from the US Department of Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) in November last year.

Ørsted and its US partner Eversource, which is now exiting the offshore wind projects it owns together with Ørsted, have already made several investments in relation to the Revolution Wind project worth hundreds of millions of US dollars, including the redevelopment of State Pier in New London and the ProvPort manufacturing facility for foundation components.

“Revolution Wind is already putting local union workers to work on both the onshore transmission system in Quonset Business Park and the wind turbine marshaling at State Pier. The start of the offshore construction phase means even more well-paying jobs and investment in the region,” said Joe Nolan, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Eversource Energy.

The offshore wind project is expected to be completed in 2025. Once fully commissioned, it will generate 400 MW of offshore wind power for Rhode Island and 304 MW for Connecticut, enough renewable energy to power more than 350,000 homes across both states.

America’s offshore wind supply chain recently marked another milestone with the christening of the first-ever US-built service operations vessel (SOV), Eco Edison, at the Port of New Orleans.

Built by more than 600 workers at shipyards in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Florida, and with components sourced from 34 states, the vessel will play an integral role in operating and maintaining Ørsted and Eversource’s offshore wind projects in the northeast, including Revolution Wind.