Van Oord has completed installing and burying inter-array cables at CrossWind’s Hollandse Kust Noord offshore wind park, bringing it a step closer to being fully operational by the end of this year. The cables are used for connecting the offshore wind turbines and transmitting electricity. Van Oord’s top duo cable-laying vessel Nexus and trencher Dig-It (a remotely-operated vehicle operated from vessel Subsea Viking) have installed a web of 69 inter-array cables measuring 140 km in total. The offshore wind park is located 18.5 kilometres off the coast of the Netherlands, near the seaside resort of Egmond aan Zee.
Van Oord designed a 66kV inter-array grid for the Hollandse Kust Noord offshore wind park, to guarantee reliable and safe transmission of the generated electricity. Dutch manufacturer TKF (Twentsche Kabelfabriek) supplied the cables. Nexus, equipped with a large 5,000 tonnes capacity cable carousel, installed the inter-array cables. Trencher Dig-It subsequently buried the cables to the required depth of between 1.0 and 1.5m. The Dig-It, a Tracked Remotely Operated Vehicle (TROV), can be used for burying cables both in “jetting mode” for sandy soils and in “chain cutter mode”’ for harder soils. At the Hollandse Kust Noord project both modes were used successfully.
Hollandse Kust Noord is located 18.5 kilometres off the Dutch coast near the town of Egmond aan Zee in The Netherlands.
(Source and image: Van Oord trencher)