Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) work on the onshore cable route for the Seagreen offshore wind farm have been completed, allowing for the installation of the electrical cables for what will become Scotland’s largest offshore wind farm.
HDD has been used to insert ducting at eight locations along the onshore cabling route between landfall at the coast of Carnoustie and the project’s new substation currently under construction at Tealing airfield.
Locations where HDD work was taking place include a number of A Roads including the major A90 and A92 trunk roads, water course crossings, a Site of Specific Scientific Interest (Barry Links SSSI), and the main East Coast rail line which connects Aberdeen to London.
“The non-intrusive nature of Horizontal Directional Drilling means that it has a minimal environmental impact. It reduces noise, vibration, waste and earthworks in comparison to the traditional method of open trenching, where plant machinery is used for the bulk removal and reinstatement of earthworks” , said Onshore Project Manager for Seagreen, Steven Reid .
“In addition, the installation process has enabled key local and national transportation routes to remain open throughout and resulted in no disruption to route users whilst the works took place below ground”.
The project team will now continue to work with Nexans, the project’s Principal Contractor, to deliver the final construction works required for the installation of the electrical infrastructure, Steven Reid said.
The cable pulling work for the project started this August. The work involves pulling the onshore cables through 19.5 kilometres of underground ducts to connect the Seagreen offshore wind farm to the Scottish national grid.
Nexans, which secured a contract for the 1,075 MW offshore wind farm in June 2020, is in charge of the design, manufacturing and installation of three 65 kilometres long offshore export cables and three 20 kilometres long onshore export cables.
Located over 27 kilometres off the Angus coast, the GBP 3 billion Seagreen 1 will comprise 114 MHI Vestas 10 MW turbines scheduled to be operational in 2022/23.
The wind farm is owned by Total (51 per cent) and SSE Renewables (49 per cent), with SSE leading the development and construction of the project.