Jan De Nul’s new offshore wind installation vessel Voltaire has called Port Esbjerg after arriving from the UAE and before heading to the UK for its first assignment. Voltaire is so far the largest installation vessel to call the Danish port, where it will mobilise for work on Dogger Bank Wind Farm.

The jack-up was built by China’s COSCO Shipping Shipyard and delivered to Jan De Nul in December last year. Shortly after the delivery, Voltaire departed for Ras Al Khaimah to undergo further commissioning and project-specific adjustments for the upcoming operations in the UK.

The vessel left the UAE shipyard at the end of March.

Voltaire is 182 metres long and 60 metres wide, and its four legs are measuring a little over 130 metres. The vessel is fitted with a 3,200-tonne Huisman Leg Encircling Crane (LEC), the largest LEC ever built, and has the capacity to lift 16,000 tonnes of cargo.

The jack-up is specifically designed to transport, hoist and install the next-generation offshore wind turbines, transition pieces and foundations, and is able to handle wind turbines of over 270 metres in height and 120 metres long blades.

At Dogger Bank Wind Farm, Voltaire will be transporting and installing a total of 277 GE Haliade-X turbines for all three of the project’s phases.

Jan De Nul signed a contract to install Haliade-X 13 MW offshore wind turbines at Dogger Bank A & B in 2020 and the following year secured the same work for Dogger Bank C, which will feature Haliade-X 14 MW turbines.

The 3.6 GW Dogger Bank Wind Farm project, being built off the North East coast of England by SSE Renewables (40 per cent), Equinor (40 per cent), and Vårgrønn (20 per cent), is the world’s largest offshore wind farm under construction.