Iberdrola will lead an international consortium that aims to install a floating turbine in excess of 10MW in Norway, and is close to joining a further demonstration project in Spain. The project in Norway, known as “Flagship”, will see the design, fabrication, installation and operation of a demonstration floating offshore wind turbine using a 10+ MW turbine and a semi-submersible floating concrete structure (OO-Star Wind Floater).
It will be tested in the North Sea, at the Met Centre located in Norway. The international consortium includes companies and institutions from Spain (Core-Marine, Cener, IHC, Zabala Innovation Consulting), Norway (Olav Olsen, Kvaerner, UnitechSubsea, Met Centre), France (EDF), Denmark (DTU) and Germany (DNV GL). The main objective of the FLAGSHIP project is to help reduce the LCOE (Levelised Cost of Energy) for floating offshore wind to a range of between 40-60€/MWh by 2030, driven by economies of scale, competitive supply chains and a variety of innovations.
Flagship is being developed as part of the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 programme. Iberdrola hopes to sign a grant agreement worth approximately €25 million with the “Innovation and Networks Executive Agency” of the European Commission during the second half of 2020. Fabrication of the floating platform could start in the second quarter of 2021, with installation in first quarter 2022.
Further plans for a floating demonstration project in Spain are also moving forward. Specific details will be finalised and published this year, but the project aims to utilise a different technology to that planned in Norway, and would see fabrication undertaken in the Basque Country, with deployment in waters around the Canary Islands or in the BIMEP (Basque Country).