NOTE: This article was updated on 1 June, following Ecowende’s announcement that the first wind turbine was installed at the offshore project site.
The first wind turbine has been installed at the Hollandse Kust West VI offshore wind farm site in the Netherlands, where the Ecowende joint venture between Shell, Eneco, and Chubu Electric Power is building what it says is the most ecological offshore wind farm yet.
The wind turbine installation campaign was launched at the port of Eemshaven, where the first towers were loaded onto Van Oord’s installation vessel Boreas at the end of May. The vessel installed the first wind turbine at its designated location on 30 May.
The 760 MW offshore wind farm, being built around 53 kilometres off the Dutch coast near IJmuiden, will comprise 52 Vestas V236-15.0 MW turbines.
Vestas is supplying seven turbines fitted with a single, red-painted blade as part of Ecowende’s initiative studying whether the contrasting colour improves rotor visibility for birds, thereby reducing collision risk.
Turbine components have been arriving at Eemshaven over recent months and are being staged at Buss Terminal before offshore transport, according to Ecowende.
The installation of foundations, manufactured by Sif and Smulders, started at the end of last year and was completed this spring. The work was also carried out by Van Oord.
In May, Dutch cable manufacturer TKF (Twentsche Kabelfabriek) loaded out the final batch of the inter-array cables for Hollandse Kust West VI onto Van Oord’s cable-laying vessel (CLV) Nexus .
The 760 MW Hollandse Kust West VI is expected to be operational by the end of 2026 and to supply roughly 3 per cent of the Netherlands’ current electricity demand.