RWE and TotalEnergies have selected the port of Eemshaven in the northern Dutch province of Groningen as the base for turbine assembly and construction work for their joint offshore wind project OranjeWind in the Dutch North Sea. To this end, the OranjeWind joint venture has signed an agreement with Buss Terminal Eemshaven.
Thomas Michel, Chief Operating Officer of RWE Offshore Wind: “The choice of construction port is crucial for any offshore wind project. Buss Terminal Eemshaven, with its marshalling and construction facilities, has capabilities that are geared towards the efficient realisation of our OranjeWind project. For this reason, we have decided to use the Buss Terminal for OranjeWind while it’s simultaneously supporting our German Nordseecluster and Danish Thor projects.”
Marc Wegman, Managing Director of Buss Terminal Eemshaven: “We are pleased to partner with RWE and TotalEnergies and serve as the base for the construction of another large offshore wind project. With our highly trained and motivated team, completing the project safely and on time is our top priority. This project will further strengthen Buss Ports’ position as a leading harbour logistics partner for offshore wind projects.”
Construction activities at the offshore wind site will start in early 2026. Buss Terminal Eemshaven will facilitate the offloading, storage, handling and pre-assembly of major components of the turbines and the inter-array cabling for the OranjeWind wind farm. The monopile foundations will be transported directly to the offshore installation site from Sif’s production facility at the Port of Rotterdam. Turbine installation at the OranjeWind offshore site, approximately 278 km from Eemshaven, is scheduled to start in early 2027, with commissioning expected to be fully completed by the end of 2027.
RWE is currently using the Buss terminal at Eemshaven to handle monopile foundations for its Danish offshore wind project Thor while preparations are being made to support construction of its German offshore wind project Nordseecluster A. The agreement for the OranjeWind project will see a marshalling area of a total of 35-40 hectares (the equivalent of approximately 55 football pitches) being used to accommodate OranjeWind and Nordseecluster B projects concurrently.
With an expected annual generation of around 3 terawatt hours, OranjeWind will produce enough green electricity to supply the equivalent of more than one million Dutch households.
OranjeWind supply chain secured
Turbine manufacturer Vestas will provide 53 of their 15-megawatt (MW) turbines to OranjeWind, while Sif will manufacture monopiles and secondary steel components. Jan De Nul Group has been contracted for various transportation and installation activities for foundations and turbines. TKF will manufacture and supply the inter-array cables, with DEME taking care of the transportation and installation of these cables. DEME is also contracted to install the secondary steel components for the foundations. Grid operator TenneT will facilitate the offshore grid connection, linking the inter-array cables to its offshore substation, from which export cables will feed into the onshore high-voltage substation in Wijk aan Zee. Upon completion, Vestas will service the wind turbines for five years under a service agreement followed by a long-term operational support agreement.
Global player in offshore wind
RWE’s global offshore wind portfolio encompasses 19 offshore wind farms in operation. Besides OranjeWind (795 MW) in the Netherlands, RWE is currently building three large-scale offshore wind farms in the North Sea: Sofia offshore wind farm (1.4 gigawatt (GW)) in the UK, Nordseecluster (1.6 GW) off the German coast and Thor (1.1 GW) in Denmark. RWE aims to triple its global offshore wind capacity from 3.3 GW today to 10 GW by 2030.
