Bladt Inks Another Major Sandbank OWF Contract

Bladt Industries will manufacture an offshore substation (OSS) for the Sandbank offshore wind farm in close cooperation with their long term partners on the fabrication of substations – Semco Maritime and ISC.

Bladt Industries has signed an EPCI contract for the fabrication of the OSS for the upcoming Sandbank Offshore Wind Farm. The contract is signed with the Joint Venture Sandbank Offshore Wind GmbH – a partnership by Vattenfall (51%) and Stadtwerke München (49%). Bladt will also manufacture 72 transition pieces for the project’s wind turbine foundations. The manufacturing of TPs is expected to start soon at Bladt’s production facilities in Aalborg, Denmark.

The upcoming OSS project is a turnkey contract and the finished topside (approximately 2,000 tons including two transformers and a helideck) and the four-legged jacket (1500 tons) is scheduled for sail-away in second quarter of 2016.

A timeframe of 18 months to fabricate a substation on an EPCI contract is a rater tight time schedule; however that is not a fact that shakes neither Bladt, ISC nor Semco. All 13 previously delivered substations have been ready according to the time schedule – recently, the company fabricated the Nordsee Ost substation within a time frame of just 16 months.

For nearly 12 years the trio – Bladt Industries, Semco Maritime and ISC – have cooperated closely together in fabrication of offshore substations. The first was back in 2002 for the Danish Offshore Wind Farm Nysted and since then there has been a steady stream of offshore substations for various clients in Europe. The contracts have ranged from PC to EPCI contracts.

“We believe that the keywords for our success within the field are knowledge, experience and cooperation. Not only cooperation between Bladt and all the subcontractors but also a very strong cooperation between the client and Bladt,” says Division Manager Troels Jensen.

This is not the first time Bladt is to deliver a substation to Vattenfall. In 2007 the end-client for the second substation manufactured by Bladt (EPC contract) was Vattenfall in Sweden with the Lillgrund project.