One of the world’s largest offshore wind power plants, Rødsand II in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Denmark, has been officially opened by its owner E.On and begun generating electricity. The facility consists of 90×2.3 MW Siemens turbines made for offshore duty. It was erected in 122 days, six weeks ahead of schedule.
Siemens Energy received the order for its construction from German utility E.ON in 2008. This large-scale project is located to the south of the island of Lolland in the Baltic Sea, and its installed capacity of 207 MW makes it one of the largest offshore wind power plants in the world. Its predecessor Rødsand I, three km to the west, began operations in 2003. It has 72 turbines of 2.3 MW each, which were delivered and installed by Siemens for the Danish utility DONG Energy.
The next milestone in the co-operation between E.ON and Siemens will be construction of the London Array off the coast of Great Britain. This megaproject will be the world’s first gigawatt-class offshore wind power plant. In the first stage, Siemens will supply 175 wind turbines of 3.6 MW each to the London Array owners’ consortium, which includes E.ON, DONG Energy and Masdar Power.
