Fair winds blow for Bremerhaven
Offshore wind is a huge focus for Bremerhaven, which is planning to build a special terminal with heavy load capacity in the River Weser.
The Offshore-Terminal-Bremerhaven (OTB) will be close to the production sites for wind turbine components and give unrestricted access to deepwater, so that the heavy components do not have to be reloaded unnecessarily.
“The offshore expertise is already here in Bremerhaven,” says Bremenports spokesman Rüdiger Staats. “Both research and development, in addition to production, are already present onsite.”
However, with the OTB not due to be operational until early 2019, Bremenports has worked with the turbine, foundation and blade manufacturers to come up with small-scale and interim solutions.
“All these heavyweight components cannot be handled on regular quay walls,” says Mr Staats. “The tripods for the Global Tech 1 windfarm, for example, weigh 860 tons per piece and an average turbine is usually over 40 tons.”
Bremerhaven has already built a heavy weight quay wall in the southern part of the old fishing port, called the Labrador Quay. However, because this quay is behind the fishing port sealocks, it cannot handle all of the demand.
Now Eurogate has rented some space at its container terminal to RWE Innogy for the storage, pre-assembly and turnover of offshore wind turbine equipment. Additional capacity has also been created on the ABC peninsula, an area usually used for car storage.
“Today it is possible for installation vessels like Innovation or Victoria Mathias to jack up in the Port of Bremerhaven and load the heavy equipment on to the ships,” says Mr Staats. However, he emphasises, these areas, which have all been strengthened to take the heavier loads, are still only interim solutions, until the OTB starts operations.