The first of three jacket foundations for the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project has left Denmark’s Port Esbjerg, headed for the U.S. on a BigLift heavy carrier vessel.
At 60 meters tall (197’) and 2,445.6 tons, the jacket foundation will support one offshore power substation. Planned as 176 turbines with a total nameplate capacity of 2.6 gigawatts, Dominion Energy’s CVOW array would be the biggest project in U.S. waters.
The foundation was fabricated at the port and moved with custom-built heavy-load vehicles over roads to the Netherlands-flagged BigLift MC-Class ro/ro carrier, and onto it 410’x138’ flush deck, with a capacity up to 16,000 metric tons.
“Port Esbjerg is the only port in the world equipped with the necessary infrastructure and capacity, including specialized heavy-lift cranes, to facilitate the production of foundations of this scale,” port officials said in a Nov. 29 statement announcing the move.
“Producing and transporting these foundations require both the right equipment and effective collaboration. Our infrastructure and capacity to handle heavy and complex constructions are crucial for ensuring a smooth process, which demands careful planning and close cooperation between technicians, logisticians and operators,” said Jesper Bank, chief commercial officer of Port Esbjerg.
During the first CVOW installation season contractors installed 78 monopile foundations for turbines, starting about 27 miles offshore, with construction expected to resume in May 2025. Dominion Energy says its construction schedule is on track with the project to be completed in late 2026.
The company’s future plans also include two additional leases it obtained from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management: 176,506 acres about 35 miles from the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, and 40,000 acres off the North Carolina Outer Banks. The company estimates those tracts could be develop to produce power up to 4 gigawatts and 800 megawatts respectively.
