First foundations for Saint-Brieuc wind farm off France leave Spanish shipyard
Iberdrola starts transfer of first four out of 62 jackets for near-500MW wind project off Brittany
Iberdrola this week started the transfer of the first four of 62 jacket foundations for the near-500MW Saint Brieuc wind farm off Brittany, France.
The jackets left the Navantia Seanergies shipyard in Fene near A Coruña in Spain to be transported for more than 1,500km in a 122-metre-long barge by contractor Van Oord towards the port of Brest in the English Channel.
The Saint-Brieuc foundations rest on three legs. Each of them is up to 75 metres high, 25 metres wide and weighs 1,150 tonnes. Iberdrola has for the first time used an innovative hydraulic device called pile grippers to fix the jackets, which provides additional fixation and stability during the installation phase, which is expected to begin in the coming months.
Saint Brieuc is the second bottom-fixed utility-scale wind farm being built off France, and Iberdrola expects the €2.5bn ($2.63bn) array 16km from the coast to start operations next year to meet the electricity needs of some 835,000 people.
Construction start at the array had been delayed for years since it was awarded in a government tender a decade ago, due to protests by fishermen, a pollution scare as well as administrative and legal challenges.
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