Sarens Installs 1,744-Tonne Offshore Wind Monopiles in Rostock, Germany

en.Wedoany.com Reported - On September 29, heavy lifting company Sarens (Sarens) disclosed that it is carrying out lifting, handling, and load-out operations for XXL monopiles at Berth 10 of the Rostock Overseas Port in Germany for the Hornsea 3 and Nordlicht I and II offshore wind projects. The work was commissioned by EEW Special Pipe Constructions, and Sarens deployed an SGC-90 fully electric ring crane and a Demag CC 2800-1 crawler crane on site. The maximum weight of the monopiles for the Hornsea 3 project is approximately 1,744 tonnes, requiring a tandem lift by two cranes; the maximum weight of the monopiles for the Nordlicht project is approximately 1,273 tonnes, which can be lifted directly onto the transport vessel by the SGC-90 in a single-crane operation.

This operation is part of the port logistics segment at EEW SPC's Rostock monopile production base. The large foundations for Hornsea 3 require tandem lifting by the SGC-90 and CC 2800-1 during load-out to meet the higher single-piece weight requirements; the Nordlicht monopiles are transferred from the quay to the transport vessel using a single-crane lifting solution. The SGC-90 is an electrically driven large ring crane, and Sarens disclosed that its energy recovery system during lowering of loads can feed up to approximately 40% of recovered electrical energy back into the port area power grid.

All 112 monopiles for Nordlicht I and II are manufactured by EEW SPC in Rostock, with 68 units configured for Nordlicht I and 44 units for Nordlicht II. EEW and Vattenfall signed a supply contract in January 2025, and the manufacturing process is expected to consume approximately 141,000 tonnes of steel, with a monopile diameter of 10 meters. The latest construction data show that the Nordlicht I monopiles have a maximum length of approximately 80.5 meters and a maximum single-piece weight of approximately 1,290 tonnes; the first foundation was installed in the German North Sea on July 1, 2026, and offshore foundation construction for Nordlicht II is planned to follow approximately one year later.

The Nordlicht cluster is developed by Vattenfall, with Phase I having an installed capacity of 980 MW and Phase II 630 MW, for a total scale of more than 1.6 GW, and will install 112 Vestas V236-15.0MW wind turbines. DEME is responsible for the offshore transport and installation of the monopiles and transition pieces for both phases, CS WIND Offshore is responsible for the manufacture of the transition pieces, and Jan De Nul is responsible for the installation of approximately 196 kilometers of inter-array cables. Nordlicht I is scheduled to be commissioned in 2028, and Nordlicht II is scheduled to be commissioned in 2029.

Hornsea 3 is located in the UK North Sea and is developed by Ørsted, with a planned installed capacity of approximately 2.9 GW. The project's latest construction plan uses 197 XXL monopiles, each with an average weight of approximately 1,670 tonnes and a length of approximately 90 meters, with a top diameter of approximately 8 meters and a maximum bottom diameter of approximately 11 meters; the first monopile was installed offshore in May 2026, and construction of the remaining foundations will continue until 2027. Ørsted also confirmed that each foundation corresponds to one 15MW-class wind turbine.

Rostock is currently also EEW's large monopile manufacturing and logistics base in Europe. EEW SPC has cumulatively produced more than 2,600 monopiles at this base and is carrying out a new round of production line expansion. According to the plan announced on September 25, starting from the second quarter of 2028, the Rostock plant will have the capability to manufacture monopiles with a maximum diameter of 12 meters and a maximum single-piece weight of 3,000 tonnes, with an annual production capacity of approximately 200,000 tonnes under normal operating conditions. The thousand-tonne-class monopile lifting and load-out operations involved in the Hornsea 3 and Nordlicht projects are all carried out directly relying on the quay at this base.