First Siemens Gamesa turbines installed at world's largest wind farm on a lake

Dutch contractor Van Oord has started the installation of 89 Siemens Gamesa turbines at Wind Farm Fryslân, which will be the world’s largest wind farm on a lake once it is operational later this year at 383MW.

From March to June this year, the SWT-DD-130 4.3MW onshore turbines earmarked for the offshore project will be shipped, installed and tested on the Ijsselmeer artificial lake north of Amsterdam.

Van Oord and Siemens Gamesa are part of the Zuiderzeewind consortium that is building the wind farm near a dam that separates the lake from the North Sea, as well as a new island nature reserve at Kornwerderzand near the wind farm.

The about 1.5 terawatt hours in output per year are equivalent to the energy consumption of about 500,000 households, and sufficient to meet three quarters of the targeted wind energy capacity of the northern Dutch province of Frisia, which has invested €127m ($151m) for a minority stake in the wind farm.

Van Oord since September 2020 has already piled in the foundations of Wind Farm Fryslân, while 55 kilometres of cables were laid on shore, and another 92 kms in the Ijsselmeer, in spite of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The island nature reserve at Kornwerderzand and the offshore substation at Breezanddijk on the Afsluitdijk dam are slated to be open to the public in the summer of 2021.