Equinor has announced the official opening of the 88MW Hywind Tampen floating offshore wind farm in the Norwegian North Sea, less than three years after starting construction in late 2020.
The floating offshore wind project was opened by the Crown Prince of Norway Haakon.
According to Equinor, the estimated investment for the Hywind Tampen project is now about NOK7.4bn ($700m). During the submission of the plan for development and operation of the project, the cost was estimated at nearly NOK5bn ($470m), which increased due to COVID-19 and other factors.
Located approximately 140km off the Norwegian coast, the floating offshore wind farm features 11 wind turbines based on Equinor’s floating Hywind concept.
It is owned by the partners of the Gullfaks and Snorre offshore fields, including Equinor, OMV, Petoro, Wintershall Dea, Vår Energi, and INPEX Idemitsu.
Claimed to be the world’s largest floating offshore wind farm, Hywind Tampen has been developed in order to provide clean energy to offshore oil and gas installations.
Currently, it is supplying electricity to the Snorre and Gullfaks fields in the Norwegian North Sea.
The project is anticipated to meet approximately 35% of the annual electricity needs of five platforms, namely Snorre A and B and Gullfaks A, B, and C.
Besides, the Norwegian floating offshore wind farm will eliminate the carbon dioxide emissions from the fields by nearly 200,000 tonnes per year.
Equinor Norway renewables business head Siri Kindem said: ”With Hywind Tampen, we have shown that we can plan, build and commission a large, floating offshore wind farm in the North Sea.
”We will use the experience and learning from this project to become even better. We will build bigger, reduce costs and build a new industry on the shoulders of the oil and gas industry.”
The Hywind Tampen floating offshore wind farm commenced power production from its first turbine in November 2022 and is fully operational now.
