Orsted Offshore Substation Portfolio

Over a period of five years, Kent provided support to Orsted with a portfolio of eight offshore substation platforms (OSPs) across four different fields – Walney Extension, Burbo Bank Extension, Race Bank and Hornsea. These platforms ranged from 300MW to 400MW, providing a totalled installed capacity of nearly 3GW. Kent’s scope included the full concept and detailed design of the platforms with the multi-disciplinary topside design along with design of jacket and piled foundations. The structures were traditional multi-deck OSPs with steel truss construction and four-legged jackets with post-installed piles.

Adopting a portfolio approach to the designs with a central project and engineering management function alongside separate teams for parallel working, Kent were able to maximise the benefit from developing multiple designs in short succession, with savings in the design effort and also fabrication from the standardisation of the designs and details. This allowed optimisation of key metrics such as the steel to equipment weight ratio whilst maintaining fabrication-friendly details to allow for smooth construction and installation within the overall project timescales.