Foss Maritime, a US service contractor that provides union jobs for its employees, has partnered with DEME Offshore US to design and build specialised US-flagged barges to transport the components to the Vineyard Wind 1 offshore wind farm area.

The Marmac in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and the Foss Prevailing Wind in Boston, both 400 feet long (approx. 122 metres), are the only two barges in existence capable of transporting in an upright position GE’s Haliade-X turbine components that, when constructed, will rise more than 700 feet (about 213 metres), said Vineyard Wind.