Buchan Offshore Wind has received Basic Design Certification from DNV for the BW Ideol-designed concrete Damping Pool floating foundation selected for its nearly 1 GW floating wind project off Scotland.
The certification covers the Buchan-specific Damping Pool design, which has been developed for the project’s North Sea site. BW Ideol’s standard 15 MW-plus Damping Pool platform received DNV Basic Design Certification in May 2025. The technology is also being used on the Floatgen demonstration project in France, which has been operating since 2018.
The Buchan floating wind farm is being developed by BayWa r.e., Elicio and BW Ideol at a site approximately 75 kilometres north-east of Fraserburgh, where up to 70 wind turbines are planned to be installed on BW Ideol’s Damping Pool foundations.
The project submitted its offshore consent applications to the Scottish Government in August 2025. In May 2026, Aberdeenshire Council approved the onshore infrastructure needed to connect the wind farm to the national transmission network at Peterhead. A decision on the offshore consent application is expected by the end of 2026.
In July, the Buchan consortium appointed Kent as Owner’s Engineer as the project moved into the Front-End Engineering Design (FEED) phase, and said that it was targeting a final investment decision and construction by the end of the decade, with the project planned to be grid-connected in the early 2030s.
According to Buchan Offshore Wind, the 1 GW floating wind farm could support around 2,900 Scottish jobs during construction and generate more than GBP 2 billion in lifetime economic value.
BW Ideol has an exclusivity agreement with the Ardersier Energy Transition Facility for the manufacture of concrete floating foundations and is working to establish a serial production facility at the former oil and gas fabrication yard on the Moray Firth.