Ørsted is placing a focus on offshore wind energy development of its Revolution Wind, South Fork and Sunrise Wind projects. At this year’s Offshore Technology Conference in Houston, Ørsted Americas's Troy Patton, head of program execution, led an offshore wind keynote session and addressed plans for the company's US wind projects, how technology is advancing and how lessons can be learned from other global wind farms. Read more.
Construction of ECO Edison vessel nears completion
Ørsted reported in April that its ECO Edison service operations vessel (SOV) is nearing construction completion at the Edison Chouest facility in Louisiana. The SOV is more than 260 ft in length, and it is said to be the first US-built SOV for the US offshore wind market. Read more.
Offshore wind developer Ørsted has pushed back commissioning of its 704-MW Revolution Wind project offshore Rhode Island from 2025 to 2026, CEO Mads Nipper said in the company’s second-quarter earnings call on Aug. 15.
The delay is due to substation construction delays and “higher-than-anticipated levels of soil contamination” at the project’s landfall site, Nipper added.
On the same day, Ørsted also reported $575 million in impairment losses, partly due to construction delays in the Revolution Wind project.
The onshore substation is being built by Eversource on a military landfill site where permitting and site preparation have proved to be more challenging than anticipated. The challenges are due to decades-old soil contamination at the planned substation site in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, where the project’s power export cable will come ashore.
The property had served in the past as Navy Air Station Quonset Point, a Naval airfield and deepwater port that dated back to World War II. That site was deactivated in 1974, but pollution issues around the old military base remained. These issues ranged from improper disposal of chemical wastes to fuel leaks and long-lived contamination from firefighting compounds, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.
“Despite encouraging progress on our US offshore wind project Revolution Wind, the construction of the onshore substation for the project has been delayed,” said Nipper, as quoted in several online reports. “This means that we have pushed the commercial operation date from 2025 into 2026, which led to an impairment. This is, of course, unsatisfactory, and we continue our dedicated efforts to de-risk our portfolio.”
