Bureau Veritas (BV), the testing, inspection and certification organisation, has been selected to undertake the project certification of Erebus, the first offshore windfarm in the Celtic Sea. It is located off the coast of Wales and is one of the largest floating offshore wind projects in the world.
Located 44km from the Pembrokeshire coastline in up to 75 m water depth, the Erebus project aims to be fully operational by 2026 and will deliver up to 100 MWe.
The project results from a collaboration of TotalEnergies and Simply Blue Group in a Joint Venture named Blue Gem Wind. Principle Power Inc. will design the floating platforms, based on the latest generation of their Windfloat technology. This floater concept received an ‘Approval in Principle’ from BV in 2016. The ballasted, semi-submersible platform supports latest generation multi-megawatt wind turbine generators. The three-column platform is moored with a five-line catenary mooring system and is equipped with a closed-loop ballast system to compensate for changes in mean wind velocity and direction.
BV will be providing independent verification and project certification in line with regulatory requirements. The scope of the evaluation includes all the design phases: site condition assessment, design basis evaluation, integrated load analysis and detailed design evaluation for all the components of the floating wind turbines, including the inter-array cables. To support the design documentation review, BV will provide independent analysis leveraging its integrated modelling tool Opera – which accounts for all components of a floating asset or wind turbine, covering everything from mooring systems to blades. Opera addresses the complex physics of aero-hydro couplings and multibody interactions and manages sea-keeping and station-keeping for floating structures.
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