New York’s First Offshore Wind Farm Completed

February 22, 2024, by Adrijana Buljan

The twelfth and final wind turbine has been installed at South Fork Wind, New York’s first offshore wind farm.

A couple of days ago, South Fork Wind, the joint venture between Ørsted and Eversource Energy, said via social media that the final wind turbine set sail to the project site from the State Pier Terminal in New London, Connecticut, over the weekend.

According to social media posts from Ørsted’s team on 21 February, the final wind turbine was installed on 20 February.

View on Twitter.

The 132 MW South Fork Wind, located some 56 kilometres east of Montauk Point, comprises twelve Siemens Gamesa 11 MW wind turbines installed on monopile foundations.

All monopile foundations and the project’s offshore substation were installed in Summer 2023, and the wind turbine components started arriving in New London around the same time.

Van Oord’s offshore installation vessel Aeolus installed the first turbine at the end of November 2023 and shortly after this, in early December 2023, the offshore wind farm delivered its first power to the grid.

With a generation capacity of 132 MW, South Fork Wind can power about 70,000 Long Island homes and eliminate up to six million tonnes of carbon emissions each year, the equivalent of taking 60,000 cars off the road, according to its developers.

Currently owned by Ørsted and Eversource, the offshore wind farm will soon see a change in ownership as Eversource Energy is in the process of selling its 50 per cent stake in South Fork Wind and Revolution Wind projects to Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), but will maintain its previously announced tax equity investment in South Fork Wind. The transaction is expected to close in mid-2024.