The construction of an offshore wind farm is the result of a collaborative effort from multiple industry specialists joining forces to combine their expertise and experience. Situated 16km off the coast of North-West France, Saint-Brieuc’s is the perfect spot to catch the bulk of the prevailing winds that barrel in from the Atlantic. This makes the Saint-Brieuc offshore wind farm a great and challenging project that we contributed to.
The most significant challenge was the hard and rocky seabed. Compared to the softer geology of the North Sea (where wind turbine foundations can be hammered into the sandy seabed), the foundations of this wind farm had to be installed in pre-drilled positions.
KENC’s contribution
Van Oord was the main contractor brought in by operator Iberdrola. They would transport and install the jacket foundations for the wind turbines and piles for the offshore substation. KENC’s involvement was to support Van Oord in their scope of work. We provided engineering services and fabricated some of the installation equipment.
Van Oord’s Project Engineer Kris Franken reflects:
“Working with an external engineering company like KENC: Getting them to do the engineering on specific equipment, gives us a great deal of flexibility. When there’s a challenge in the design, they are one step ahead with a solution. This really speeds up the process. So, instead of us starting off with a blank sheet of paper, they have were already started getting their ideas ready.”
“Our first contact about Saint-Brieuc with Van Oord was towards the end of 2020,” says KENC’s Project Manager Cor Hilbrink. “From that moment onwards, we worked in an intensive cooperation with the Van Oord team to deliver the tailor-made engineering they required throughout the various phases of their T&I contract.”
The most eye-catching element of KENC’s scope is perhaps the design and engineering of a Casing Lift Adapter (CLA), a crucial lifting tool which comes into play during drilling operations. “The CLA ensured the precise positioning of the drilling tools – it had a ‘standard’ lifting capacity of 280 tonnes which was backed up by its contingency capacity of 1,100 tonnes,” Cor continues. “For this CLA scope, we were actually contracted by Breman Machinery, who in turn were contracted by Van Oord. As such, the CLA is a good demonstration of how different project stakeholders come together to pool their knowledge and expertise to produce an innovative installation tool.”
While the custom-made innovative lifting and handling tools commonly get most of the media attention during the installation of an offshore wind farm, the majority of a project scope often consists of less glamourous subjects. This is also true for KENC’s work for Van Oord on Saint-Brieuc. “There are so many phases in an offshore wind installation project, each involving multiple vessels and associated equipment. It is like one big jigsaw puzzle – everything has to be in the right place and at the right time,” Cor continues. “We provided the engineering for many of the pieces of the Saint-Brieuc puzzle, all of which had to be interfaced either with Van Oord’s installation vessel Aeolus or one of the other vessels involved.”
KENC’s seafastening scope on the Saint-Brieuc project was just as extensive. Several (support) vessels were mobilised at different stages to carry out the work as it progressed; from drilling of foundations, grouting, installation of casing and, finally, the installation of jackets. All these vessels transported mission-critical equipment – such as ROVs, pile-cleaning and grouting equipment to name a few – all of which required seafastening sufficient to deal with the maximum allowed significant wave heights that were permitted for the project.
Van Oord – and therefore, also KENC – completed its work on the Saint-Brieuc offshore wind farm in November 2023. When fully commissioned, Saint-Brieuc will be France’s second offshore wind farm, generating 496MW of electricity: a significant first step towards the country’s climate goals. “Working with KENC was very positive,” concludes Kris. “Their working and communication style is quick, flexible and efficient: due to the time pressure on this project, this was exactly what was needed. The style of working really fits our needs.”
Cor replies: “We are proud to have played our part in this successful project, supporting our client in a positive and productive way throughout, working together towards a fantastic end-result.”
