Race Bank Offshore Wind Farm Officially Opens
Thursday 14 June 2018
Race Bank, a new offshore wind farm capable of powering over half a million UK homes, was officially opened at a ceremony in Grimsby on 13th June 2018.
Race Bank is owned by Ørsted (50%), Macquarie European Infrastructure Fund 5 (25%), Sumitomo Corporation (12.5%) and funds advised by the Green Investment Group, Arjun Infrastructure Partners and Gravis Capital Management (12.5%).
Race Bank is capable of generating 573 megawatts (MW) of green electricity from its 91 Siemens Gamesa 6MW wind turbines. Many of these turbines feature the first blades to be manufactured at the Siemens Gamesa blade factory in Hull.
The wind farm is located off the North Norfolk coast and is operated from Ørsted’s East Coast Hub in Grimsby, the UK’s largest offshore wind Operations and Maintenance (O&M) base. The project features a new way of carrying out offshore maintenance, using a state of the art Service Operation Vessel (SOV) that remains offshore with technicians working shifts of 14 days on and 14 days off.
Race Bank becomes the 10th UK offshore wind farm that Ørsted either owns and partly owns, and together these projects provide over 3,000MW of green energy – enough to power 2.7 million UK homes.
Ørsted has worked closely with a number of important UK suppliers on the Race Bank project. These include J Murphy, working on the onshore substation and onshore export cable installation, as well as cable manufacturers JDR and installation specialists DeepOcean, both based in Teesside.
Ørsted has reinforced its commitment to the Grimsby and Humber area by accepting a position on the Great Grimsby Partnership Board. This programme has been supported by UK Government through the recent announcement of a pilot Town Deal in the Industrial Strategy White Paper.
Ørsted has also invested in the community through its East Coast Community Fund, sponsorships such as the Ørsted Great Grimsby 10K and a partnership with Teach First to address educational inequalities in the region.