First Turbine Up at 704 MW Revolution Wind Project in US

September 4, 2024, by Adnan Memija

The first of the 65 Siemens Gamesa SG 11.0-200 DD wind turbines has been installed at Ørsted’s 704 MW Revolution Wind offshore wind farm in the US.

Ørsted Revolution Wind — *Credit: Kate Ciembronowicz/ Ørsted*

The Revolution Wind offshore wind farm will utilise 65 Siemens Gamesa turbines, the same 11 MW turbine model used at the recently completed South Fork Wind.

Once in operation, the project will have the capacity to generate 400 MW of renewable energy for Rhode Island and 304 MW of the same for Connecticut, enough to power more than 350,000 homes, Ørsted said.

“Revolution Wind is bringing local union jobs and economic development to Rhode Island and Connecticut, and it will deliver clean offshore wind power to hundreds of thousands of homes in the region. We thank our state and federal partners, our hard-working construction, marine and safety teams, and our local labor, port, and supply chain partners, as we continue building this historic project”, stated David Hardy, Group EVP and CEO Americas at Ørsted.

Revolution Wind’s offshore construction phase is powered by hundreds of union workers, three Northeast ports, and a variety of vessels, all supporting work to install the wind farm’s foundations, two offshore substations, inter-array and export cables, and Siemens Gamesa wind turbines.

Meanwhile, offshore construction teams continue to make progress installing the foundations, with more than three-quarters of the units now in place offshore, according to the developer.

Seaway7’s Seaway Aimery vessel arrived in Providence, Rhode Island, last week and commenced pre-lay operations ready to start cable-laying this week on the Revolution Wind project. The US-flagged Ross Candies also arrived during the weekend to support cable installation.

Three New England ports are playing central roles in the effort to build the 704 MW Revolution Wind project.

State Pier in New England, Connecticut, is serving as the staging and marshalling port for the project, where the turbines are being assembled by local union labor. Ørsted and Eversource have invested more than USD 100 million in the State Pier redevelopment project.

“New London State Pier has cemented itself as one of the premier wind turbine marshaling hubs in the country, and we are proud to be playing a significant role in the construction of Connecticut’s first offshore wind farm and the first multi-state project in the country,” said Ulysses Hammond, Connecticut Port Authority Executive Director.

In Providence, teams are handling loadout of the foundation components, which were built by more than 125 local union workers at Ørsted and Eversource’s construction hub at ProvPort.

ECO Edison, the first American-built, owned, and crewed service operation vessel (SOV), is based out of ProvPort during Revolution Wind’s construction, while the project’s crew helicopters and Rhode Island-built crew transfer vessels (CTVs) are based out of that state’s Quonset Point.

Onshore construction on the project’s transmission system continues in North Kingstown, Rhode Island.

Last month, Ørsted announced that the 704 MW Revolution Wind offshore wind farm will not go into full commercial operation next year but in 2026. Mads Nipper, the company’s group president and CEO, explained the postponement was due to a delay in the construction of the project’s onshore substation.

The Revolution Wind project site, located about 15 miles south of the Rhode Island coast and 32 miles southeast of the Connecticut coast, is adjacent to Ørsted and Eversource’s South Fork Wind, America’s first utility-scale offshore wind farm.

When it comes to Ørsted, the company recently marked the groundbreaking for another neighbouring project, the 924 MW Sunrise Wind.