Sembcorp Marine Adds Iv-Offshore & Energy to Sofia Offshore Substation Team

Iv-Offshore & Energy b.v. has signed the main contract with Sembcorp Marine Integrated Yard Pte Ltd (SMIY) to supply engineering and procurement services for the high voltage direct current (HVDC) offshore converter platform of RWE’s Sofia offshore wind farm.

Sofia offshore wind farm, located off the northeast coastline of the UK, will have a capacity of 1.4 gigawatts that will power the equivalent of nearly 1.2 million UK homes, making it one of the largest offshore wind farms in the world when completed.

Sembcorp Marine’s scope of work for the contract includes the design, construction, installation, and commissioning of the offshore converter platform (OCP).

The OCP comprises a 10,000-tonne topside and a 7,000-tonne jacket foundation structure piled into the seabed 220 kilometres from the nearest shore and will be the most powerful and most remote OCP ever built, Iv-Offshore & Energy said.

Iv-Offshore & Energy is SMIY’s engineering subcontractor for the balance of plant installation in this endeavour and shall provide detailed design for both the topside and jacket and procurement of topside auxiliary equipment.

Sembcorp Marine would begin fabrication of the platform at its yard in Batam, Indonesia in the third quarter of 2021, and the offshore installation is slated to be completed by the end of 2024.

Sofia is located on Dogger Bank, 195 kilometres from the nearest point on the UK’s North East coast.

The GBP 3 billion wind farm will have a single offshore converter platform, with the electricity generated transported via a high voltage direct current export cable to landfall 220 kilometres away in Redcar, Teesside.

A specially formed consortium of GE Renewable Energy’s Grid Solutions and Sembcorp Marine has been selected to supply the transmission system for Sofia, including two HVDC converter stations.

Apart from the converter platforms, the wind farm will feature 100 Siemens Gamesa SG 14-222 DD wind turbines scheduled to be fully commissioned in 2026.