Monopile installation for Walney 2 completed
On Saturday 9 April 2011, the first monopile for Walney 2 was installed, and less than three months later all 51 monopiles have been installed.

On Sunday 2 July 2011 the last of the 51 monopiles for Walney 2 was successfully driven into the sea bed, and thus the basic foundation for the 51 turbines in Walney 2 is now in place.

The installation crew celebrated the last pile (Photo kindly provided by Ballast Nedam).

After the successful installation, the installation vessel Svanen demobilised and has now left the site. 

Intense installation activity
Right now the installation activities for Walney 2 are booming. Crane barges, jack-up vessels and tugs are working out of ports in the East Irish Sea area, primarily out of the ports of Barrow and Mostyn.

On 45 of the 51 monopile positions, a transition piece has already been installed, and the last batch of transition pieces has recently been unloaded at the Port of Barrow.

Goliath has currently installed 45 transition pieces on Walney 2.

Walney 2 is to be constructed with turbine and cable installation being performed in parallel in order to shorten the construction timeframe, and right now 29 turbines and 12 array cables have been installed on Walney 2.

Stemat 82 - working in the background - is the main installation vessel placing the array cables between the turbines and the offshore substation.

         Two turbine installation vessels, Leviathan and Kraken, are working in parallel out of the Port of Mostyn. Here Kraken is installing the second blade on a turbine.

Export cable for Walney 2 in place
The export cable pull for the Walney 2 substation was completed at 04.00 on Sunday 3 July, when the export cable was pulled up to the cable deck of the offshore substation. Here the cable ends are being terminated and the fibre optic cables are currently being jointed. 

The export cable pull took place on the night between Saturday and Sunday 3 July.


The export cable was carefully guided to its position.
 

Export cable joint completed
The two parts of the export cable have been laid and on Wednesday 20 July, the export cable joint was completed. The export cable connects the national grid at Cleveleys near Blackpool with the offshore substation placed inside the wind farm.

In the front, Walney 1 with its offshore substation in operation. In the background - approx 5km away, the Walney 2 offshore substation is visible.

Extensive test before the power can be switched on
When Walney 2 will be producing power, the power from the 51 turbines in the Walney 2 Offshore Windfarm will be collected by the  substation, but right now the only power available on the substation is being produced by diesel driven generators, and before the mainland connection can be switched on, a number of electrical tests have to be performed to secure safe commissioning of the offshore substation.

Onshore substation for Walney 2 ready for operation
The onshore transformer at Cleveleys near Blackpool has been tested and is now ready for energisation.
The perimeter fence around the substation is in place and the substation now meets the High voltage rules with restricted access.

Inside the substation the harmonic filter compound has been finished and tested. The site has been sealed with concrete and rainwater collection has been established to collect all rain water and prevent that contaminated surface water is released to the surrounding soil.

Marine Management Organisation and Natural England conducting licence inspection for Walney 2
On 29 June 2011, Marine Management Organisation and Natural England conducted a site visit at Walney 2 for inspection of the current Marine Licence. The aim of the visit was to inspect Walney Offshore Windfarms implementation of the marine mammal mitigation during piling of monopiles by Svanen.

Noise from piling of monopiles may impact marine mammals and cause disturbance or even injury to animals appearing close to the piling. Therefore a vessel with marine mammal observers (MMO) is in place during each piling to ensure a 'marine mammals free' sea in a radius of 500m from the piling location. This is done by visual observation in combination with applying Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) equipment. This implementation of the licence requirements is given in a Marine Mammal Mitigation Programme.

The inspection was conducted by two staff members from Marine Management Organisation and one staff member from Natural England.