Baltic Wind Success Paves Way for Ecosse

Ecosse Subsea Systems (ESS) has completed a $7.5m boulder clearing and pre-lay trenching project which it claims has been one of the most successful ever conducted for the wind energy sector. As subcontractor to Siem Offshore Contractors (SOC), the Banchory-based subsea specialist completed 86 boulder clearing passes followed by 172 first and multi-passes over a 90km route during a 13-week boulder clearing and trenching campaign on the EnBW Baltic 2 offshore wind farm project.

Several thousand boulders ranging up to 4m in size were cleared from the individual cable routes and ESS performed 260 individual route passes in varying and sometimes challenging soil conditions. EnBW Baltic 2 is an 80 turbine development located 32km north of Rügen island in the German exclusive economic zone of the Baltic Sea and owned by the German utility company EnBW. The 27 sq. km site spans water depths ranging from 20m to 45m LAT and has a wide array of soil conditions from fine sands to glacial tilt with areas of gravels and cobbles with numerous boulders.

ecosse-subsea.com

(As published in the October 2013 edition of Marine Technology Reporter - www.seadiscovery.com)