Hollandse Kust Noord Offshore Wind Park, The Netherlands

The Hollandse Kust Noord (HKN) Offshore Wind Park is a 759MW offshore wind farm being developed off the coast of The Netherlands.

A joint venture (JV) between Shell (79.9%) and Eneco (20.1%) called CrossWind was created to develop the wind farm.

Hollandse Kust Noord is the third project to be delivered under the Dutch national offshore wind roadmap based on subsidy-free tenders. The project is estimated to cost around €1.4bn.

The necessary permission to build the wind farm was received in July 2020 and construction works commenced in October 2022.

The final monopile for HKN was installed in February 2023. It was followed by the installation of the first turbine in April 2023.

Hollandse Kust Noord Offshore Wind Park produced first electricity in June 2023. The project is expected to achieve full production by the end of 2023.

Once fully commissioned, the offshore wind park will generate at least 3.3TWh of green electricity per year.

Hollandse Kust Noord Location Details

The Hollandse Kust Noord Offshore Wind Park is located around 18.5km off the coast of the Dutch province of North Holland, near the town of Egmond aan Zee, in North Sea.

The total surface area of the HKN wind farm is approximately 125km², including maintenance and safety zones.

Hollandse Kust Noord Infrastructure

The offshore wind project comprises 69 SG 11.0-200 DD turbines, each with a capacity of 11MW. Most of these turbines are being installed over 1km from each other, at around 15m-28m of water depth.

The wind turbines feature a rotor diameter of 200m, with 97m-long turbine blades. They are installed on monopile foundations weighing between 788 tonnes and 960 tonnes each.

The offshore transformer station for the Hollandse Kust Noord wind farm will comprise a 45m-high jacket placed in 24m water depth.

The topside structure will have four decks weighing around 4,100tonnes. This structure will be 47m long, 35m wide and 25m high, excluding antenna tower and top deck crane.

Transmission system operator TenneT will realise the grid connection for the wind farm.

The renewable electricity produced from the HKN wind farm is transferred through the offshore grid, the connection from the Hollandse Kust Noord until the high-voltage substation in Beverwijk.

The green energy will be distributed to the consumers via the national high-voltage grid.

The project will enable CrossWind to supply wind energy enough to meet electricity consumption requirements for more than 1 million Dutch households.

Contractors Involved

In September 2018, Fugro was contracted by CrossWind for comprehensive geotechnical services.

In February 2021, Siemens Gamesa won the contract to deliver 69 SG 11.0-200 DD offshore wind turbines for the 759MW offshore wind park. The scope of work also includes 15 years of maintenance services.

In July 2020, Van Oord was contracted for the Balance of Plant scope for the Hollandse Kust Noord project.

Van Oord was responsible for the engineering, procurement, construction, and installation (EPCI) of the foundations, inter-array cables, and transportation and installation of the wind turbines. The company deployed offshore installation vessels Aeolus, MPI Adventure, and MPI Resolution and cable-laying vessel Nexus for the project.

Sif Holding was engaged to manufacture 70 TP-less design monopiles for Van Oord in December 2020, while DEME Offshore was contracted for the transportation and installation of the jacket and topside for the offshore substation.

Steel construction company Smulders and EQUANS built the offshore substation for the offshore wind farm for TenneT.

TenneT selected the consortium Jan De Nul Group and LS Cable & System to connect the HKN windfarm with the electric grid on the mainland.

Jan De Nul Group was contracted for the transport, installation, and protection of the electricity cables, and LS Cable & System was engaged for the cable design and production, as well as connection and testing of circuits.

In April 2022, CrossWind appointed ABL Group to provide Marine Warranty Survey (MWS) services for the offshore transportation and installation (T&I) of the wind turbines for the HKN project.

Financing and Other Agreements

The European Investment Bank (EIB) green lighted approximately €500m for the Hollandse Kust Noord offshore wind farm in 2019.

In March 2021, TenneT and CrossWind signed agreements for the construction of the offshore grid connection for the wind farm.

E-commerce giant Amazon signed an agreement with Crosswind in 2021 to buy 380MW of power from Hollandse Kust Noord.