The Diplomat
Iberdrola has begun commissioning the Vineyard Wind I offshore wind farm, the first large-scale project of this technology in the United States, with 806 megawatts (MW) of capacity, the Spanish company said yesterday.
Specifically, the facility has already begun to supply green energy to Massachusetts, a state that will supply wind power to more than 400,000 homes, which is more than half of a city like Boston or the entire island of Mallorca, said the company chaired by Ignacio Sánchez Galán.
The project, which expects to have five turbines operating at full capacity in the early part of the year, has received an investment of 3,000 million dollars (more than 2,700 million euros at the current exchange rate) guaranteed by contracts with the three main electricity companies in the state, reports Europa Press.
The park began construction in 2021 and will be fully operational this year, avoiding the emission of more than 1.6 million tonnes of CO2 per year, the equivalent of removing 325,000 vehicles from the roads.
Each of the turbines, whose transition parts have been manufactured by the Asturian company Windar Renovables, will provide energy to more than 6,000 homes and businesses.
Comprising a tower, three blades and a nacelle, they have a rated capacity of 13 megawatts (MW), “making it the largest turbine in the western world”, according to Iberdrola, which added that, with a single rotation, this turbine can power a Massachusetts home for an entire day.
“We are delivering the first clean offshore wind power to the Massachusetts grid. We are at a watershed moment for climate action in the United States and we are experiencing a dawning for the nation’s offshore wind industry. As the capacity of this historic project comes online, we will continue to support all of the partners who have made this achievement possible,” said Pedro Azagra, CEO of Avangrid, Iberdrola’s US subsidiary.
Avangrid and Danish investment group Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), a co-owner of the project, announced last October that Vineyard Wind 1 had closed a $1.2 billion (around €1.135 billion) fiscal equity package, the first of its kind for commercial-scale offshore wind with three US-based banks.
Spanish company Windar Renovables has been commissioned to manufacture the 62 foundations for the wind turbines. The contract, worth nearly 100 million euros, has created nearly 400 jobs at its facilities in Asturias.
For its part, the Italian Prysmian Group has been responsible for the commissioning of the submarine cable system that connects the offshore wind farm to the US mainland electricity grid. In total, more than 134 kilometres of high-voltage AC power cable were required.
The US company Southwire was responsible for the design, manufacture and installation of the more than 51 kilometres of high-voltage onshore cable.
The installation of the offshore substation, which will serve the entire Vineyard Wind I project, was completed in July 2023. It is the first substation of its kind installed by Iberdrola in the United States and the sixth in the world, weighing more than 5,000 tonnes, making it the largest the company has ever installed.
Within Iberdrola’s renewables portfolio, offshore wind energy is one of the company’s major commitments, with new growth platforms in Poland, Sweden, Ireland, the United States, Brazil, the Philippines and Japan, which has enabled it to currently have an offshore wind portfolio of more than 30 gigawatts (GW).
In this way, the company is assured of meeting its plan by 2025, when it will reach 3,100 MW in operation.
In addition to Vineyard Wind I, the company’s most important projects include the East Anglia Hub complex in the United Kingdom, which contains three projects with a total installed capacity of 2,900 MW, Saint-Brieuc in France, and its three wind farms in Baltic waters: Wikinger, Baltic Eagle and Windanker.
