TetraSpar Demonstrator operating offshore Norway

Offshore staff

ESSEN, Germany – The TetraSpar Demonstrator floating wind project is now commissioned and in operation at the METCentre test site in Norway.

The TetraSpar foundation is a tubular steel structure with a suspended keel. It is anchored in 200 m (656 ft) of water.

The project will now enter its test phase where data on the performance and characteristics of the TetraSpar floating foundation will be captured and analyzed to pave the way for commercial-scale floating wind projects.

The project partners are Shell, RWE, TEPCO Renewables, and Stiesdal Offshore Technologies.

Earlier this summer, the TetraSpar Demonstrator reached its destination at the METCentre test site after a 360-nautical mile tow from the port of assembly in Grenaa, Denmark.

The partners said the commissioning of the 3.6-MW Siemens turbine is the last in a string of milestones for the project:

• Completion of the factory manufacturing of the components for the world’s first industrially manufactured floating offshore foundation
• Fast assembly of the modules at the quayside, requiring no welding and no special port facilities
• Launch using a semisubmersible barge, followed by rapid turbine installation using an ordinary onshore crane
• Safe deployment of the keel when towed to location of sufficient depth, making the TetraSpar Demonstrator the world’s first spar foundation capable of deployment from an ordinary, shallow-water port.

The demonstration project has shown that Stiesdal’s ‘Tetra’ concept remains on target to offer important advantages over existing floating wind concepts, with the potential for leaner manufacturing, assembly, and installation processes, and lower material costs.

12/01/2021