Independent inspection services provider TÜV Rheinland and offshore installation project certification specialist Hanseatic Power Cert (HPC) have been awarded a contract for the role of the appointed inspectors at Ocean Breeze Energy’s 400MW Bard Offshore 1 wind farm.
TÜV Rheinland and HPC will carry out periodic inspections to make sure that the wind farm’s infrastructure is in accordance with the standards set out by the German Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency (BSH).
“Together with our cooperation partner Hanseatic Power Cert (HPC), we will be in charge of monitoring and conducting the periodic inspections for the offshore wind farm. This includes all foundations, 20 offshore turbines and the substation,” said TÜV Rheinland project manager Andreas Puls.
Bard Offshore 1 recently became the first offshore wind farm in Germany to produce over 3 TWh of energy.
“In the preliminary stages, we carefully examined Ocean Breeze’s inspection plan,” said Puls.
”In this context, TÜV Rheinland experts check whether the submitted procedure complies with the standards of the BSH. For the periodic inspections themselves this is the first time that some of them are based on the reporting situation of external independent inspectors. Beforehand the qualifications of these inspectors were checked and the inspections are then monitored at random by TÜV Rheinland. This results in an economic advantage for the operator.”
TÜV Rheinland will provide turbine specialists while HPC will be in charge of the structures.
Bard Offshore 1 is located 100 kilometers northwest of Borkum and comprises 80 BARD 5.0 MW wind turbines installed at water depths of up to 40 metres.