Meyer Werft steps into offshore wind market with new steel construction deal

German shipbuilding company Meyer Werft has been awarded its first contract for steel construction work for four of Amprion’s offshore converter platforms.

Amprion Offshore has commissioned Dragados Offshore and Siemens Energy to build the offshore converter platforms.

The consortium has now awarded parts of the production to Meyer Werft.

Amprion said that the shipyard is to produce around 43,500 tones of steel components for the four grid connection systems DolWin4 and BorWin4 as well as BalWin1 and BalWin2 in the North Sea.

Of this, around 32,000 tones are used to produce sections for the BalWin1 and BalWin2 projects, while for the DolWin4 and BorWin4, it is around 11,500 tones.

The components are planned to be delivered from autumn 2024 to spring 2027.

The contract marks entry into the offshore wind market, Meyer Werft noted.

Last year, the shipbuilder formed a joint venture with Finnish floating real estate company Admares Marine, expanding its interest into the floating solutions business.

The new company, headquartered in Turku, Finland, is named Meyer Floating Solutions and is focused on developing and manufacturing floating real estate.

“This order is a milestone for us in our entry into the construction of converter platforms, which we will also build at NEPTUN WERFT in Rostock in the future. This successful expansion of our product portfolio secures knowledge and employment at our German shipyards and at the same time makes a decisive contribution to the energy transition,” said Jan Meyer, Managing Director of Meyer Werft.

The four offshore grid connection systems DolWin4 and BorWin4 as well as BalWin1 and BalWin2 connect wind farms in the North Sea with the transmission grid on land. They are installed largely parallel to each other on both the land and sea sides, said Amprion.

The DolWin4 and BorWin4 projects will transmit together a power of 1.8 GW and are scheduled to go into operation in 2028.

BalWin1 and BalWin2, each capable of transmitting 2 GW, are scheduled to go into operation in 2029 and 2030, respectively.