Launch of Construction Work on the Electrical Substation of the Future Saint Nazaire Offshore Wind Farm

The first section of sheet metal for the electrical substation that will equip the Saint Nazaire offshore wind farm, France’s first such facility, was cut on 10th January at the Chantiers de l’Atlantique Shipyard in Saint Nazaire.

Ordered in August of last year by the Company Parc du Banc de Guérande (PBG), which is co-owned by EDF Renouvelables and Enbridge Inc., the substation will leave the shipyard in the summer of 2021, and will then be connected to the wind turbines in 2022. This piece of equipment will make it possible to collect and to transform the electricity produced by the future wind turbines for subsequent transfer to the onshore electricity network, while at the same time serving to locally control the wind farm facility. The nacelles and turbines of the eighty Haliade-150-type 6 MW machines will be built by General Electric (GE) at its Montoir plant, while the blades will be built at its Cherbourg plant. The Saint Nazaire wind farm substation will generate 480 MW of power.

Furthermore, the same consortium led by Atlantique Offshore Energy (the Chantiers de l’Atlantique Shipyard’s dedicated marine energy business unit), together with its partners GE Grid Solutions and SDI (DEME Offshore), has also been chosen by the Companies Eoliennes Offshore des Hautes Falaises and Eoliennes Offshore du Calvados, which are owned by EDF Renouvelables, Enbridge and wpd offshore, to design, manufacture and install the two substations for the wind farms sited off Fécamp and Courseulles-sur-Mer, in Normandy.

Designed to produce approximately 500 MW of power in total, the Fécamp substation should be delivered at the end of 2022, while the delivery of the Courseulles-sur-Mer substation, which will generate around 450 MW of power, is scheduled for 2023. Over the life of these three projects, more than 400 jobs will be mobilized in the Saint Nazaire labour market area, at the Chantiers de l’Atlantique Shipyard and with the co-implementers.

Once commissioned, the three offshore wind farms will be sufficient to cover the equivalent of the domestic electricity consumption of nearly two million people in France.

Contact at Chantiers de l'Atlantique Shipyard – Philippe Kasse