GWS, Swire Secure O&M Contract for Horns Rev 1 Offshore Wind Farm

Vattenfall has awarded contracts to Swire Energy Services and Global Wind Service (GWS) for operations and maintenance (O&M) work on Horns Rev 1, the world’s first large-scale offshore wind farm, which is operating offshore Denmark.

The contracts, worth approximately EUR 15 million in total, cover preventative services and additional O&M campaigns. The work is set to start on 30 March 2025 and the contracts will be in effect until 30 December 2026, according to a public contract award notice.

Horns Rev 1 comprises an offshore substation and 80 Vestas V80-2MW turbines, installed at a site some 14 kilometres west of Esbjerg in the North Sea. The offshore wind farm is operated from Esbjerg with the transit to its turbines being mainly done by crew transfer vessels and helicopter.

With an installed capacity of 160 MW, Horns Rev 1, built between 2002 and 2003, is the world’s first large-scale offshore wind farm and is also the first wind farm to be installed in the North Sea. 

The offshore wind farm was built by Elsam (later DONG, now Ørsted). Vattenfall acquired a 60 per cent stake in Horns Rev 1 in 2005 and today owns the wind farm together with Ørsted (40 per cent), with Vattenfall being the operator.