Tepco Renewable Power (Tepco RP) has joined the TetraSpar floating foundation demonstration project, alongside Shell, RWE, and Stiesdal Offshore Technologies. The share structure after Tepco RP's project entry is: Shell: 46.2%. TEPCO RP: 30.0%. RWE: 23.1%. Stiesdal Offshore Technologies 0.7%.The TetraSpar full-scale demonstration project has completed the onshore assembly of a factory-made floating offshore wind foundation in the port of Grenaa, Denmark.
The TetraSpar foundation is a tetrahedral structure assembled from tubular steel components. The components were manufactured at the facilities of the Danish wind turbine tower manufacturer Welcon A/S. The components were then transported to the port of Grenaa over the summer 2020 and were assembled in October and November 2020. The assembly involves no welding or other special process.
Following the launch of the foundation in 2021, the wind turbine will be mounted on the foundation at the quayside using a land-based crane. From there, the combined structure will be towed to the test site in the northern part of the North Sea, moored to the seabed with three anchor lines and connected to the electrical grid. It will be located approximately 10 kilometres from shore in water depths of 200 metres at the test site of the Marine Energy Test Centre (Metcentre) near Stavanger in Norway. The demonstration project will use a 3.6MW direct drive offshore wind turbine from Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy. The commissioning is planned for summer 2021.
