Marina Rosemeyer on board the BLUE ARIES in the Wikinger offshore wind farm
A week of experience onboard the BLUE ARIES in the Wikinger offshore construction site. A challenge and an exciting time for the engineer Marina Rosemeyer from HYDROTECHNIK LÜBECK.
The Wikinger wind farm is the third wind farm off Rügen. It is located about 35 kilometers northeast of the island. It is being built by the Spanish energy company Iberdrola. The systems should be ready for operation at the beginning of 2017. At full capacity, Wikinger delivers an output of 350 megawatts. It supplies up to 350,000 households with energy.
After Baltic 1 and Baltic 2, Wikinger is the third wind farm in the German Baltic Sea. Iberdrola is already planning another project. Work on the Windanker wind farm near Wikinger could start in 2021.
For the Viking wind turbines, jacket foundations are anchored to the seafloor at a depth of around 25 to 45 meters. The special ship GIANT 7 drives 4 piles per foundation into the seafloor. The Big Bubble Curtain is also used here to reduce noise.
Our work processes were very dependent on the installation vessel. Therefore, the hoses were picked up at night and laid out in the new positions. At one position there was an extreme delay in the piling work. There was a layer of rock under the pile. It had to be drilled open by another ship. Moving the ships and then positioning them turned out to be more complicated than planned. Fortunately, the weather was on our side. We got no further delays.
Marina Rosemeyer, engineer for maritime technologies
Marina Rosemeyer was on board the BLUE ARIES to observe and document the testing of new system components of the Big Bubble Curtain in practice.
