On 1 July 2018, wind turbines with the world’s largest capacity started operations at Vattenfall’s offshore wind farm ‘Aberdeen Bay’. One single rotor lap from the record 8.8 MW turbine can provide a British household with electricity for a full day.
The Aberdeen Bay wind farm, or EOWDC (European Offshore Wind Deployment Center), is Scotland’s largest wind farm that will produce electricity to about 80,000 British households (312 GWh) every year. The eleven wind turbines, two 8.8 MW and nine 8.4 MW, have the largest turbine capacity in commercial operation in the world.
Gunnar Groebler, Head of Business Area Wind at Vattenfall, mentioned:
The fact that EOWDC now can start delivering electricity after a very short construction time is satisfactory. Now Vattenfall is given the opportunity to continue to push forward the development of tomorrow’s wind power technology, thus helping our customers to live fossil-free within a generation.
Aberdeen Bay also tests the future wind power technology, which is one of the first testing facilities of its kind. The goal is to transform the wind power industry into competitive renewable electricity generation.
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In addition, instead of using traditional monopiles, a new technique has been used at Aberdeen Bay; the suction buckets. This method is silent, thus minimizing the disturbance of wildlife at sea.
EOWDC has also received 0.5 million euros from the EU, for studies of marine wildlife around wind farms. Dolphins, salmon, sea trout and sea birds belong to the species to be studied at the wind farm.
