Equinor and partners at Gullfaks and Snorre have decided to explore the possibilities of supplying the Gullfaks and Snorre fields with power from floating offshore wind. This could be the first time an offshore wind farm is directly connected to oil and gas platforms.
The project forecasts a reduction of CO2 emissions by more than 200,000 tonnes per year, equivalent to the emissions from 100,000 cars.
Equinor has performed an extensive study evaluating which oil and gas installations on the NCS are suited for power supply from a floating offshore wind farm. The Snorre and Gullfaks fields in the Tampen area in the northern North Sea are the best match for realising this idea.
“Reducing the use of gas turbines by supplying platforms with power from floating offshore wind is a challenging and innovative project. It may also facilitate new industrial opportunities for Norway, Equinor and Norwegian supply industry within profitable renewable energy, while enabling oil and gas production with low CO2 emissions. The Hywind Tampen project is contributing to further developing floating offshore wind technology, reducing costs and making the solutions more competitive,” says Equinor’s executive vice president for New Energy Solutions, Pal Eitrheim.
The solution to be further explored is a wind farm consisting of 11 wind turbines based on Equinor’s floating offshore wind concept, Hywind. The 8 MW turbines will have a combined capacity of 88 MW, and are estimated to meet about 35% of the annual power demand of the five Snorre A and B, and Gullfaks A, B and C platforms. In periods of higher wind speed this percentage will be significantly higher.
“The partners have now made a concept choice for an offshore wind farm tied in to the two fields. This is still a groundbreaking and challenging project that requires optimisation of the technical solutions and further cost reductions before the partners can make a potential investment decision,” says Equinor’s project director, Olav-Bernt Haga. (Source and image: Equinor – Artist view of the Hywind Tampen project)