After a year of successfully testing the Slip Joint connection, the DOT wind turbine is decommissioned
With the removal of the DOT wind turbine all phases of this concept’s lifetime are investigated and successfully put to the test.
Friday morning the 16th of August 2019 the wind turbine, outfitted with a Slip Joint connection, was successfully removed from its monopile foundation.
The DOT wind turbine was located in Eneco’s Princes Amalia Wind Park off the coast of IJmuiden, the Netherlands. The complete wind turbine was picked up in a single lift from its monopile foundation to be transported towards and backloaded on the quay of Sif Rotterdam for further onshore decommissioning. Same as during the installation, the offshore removal of the wind turbine was executed by Heerema’s DCV Aegir being operated on its Dynamic Positioning System. This way of working in combination with the use of a slip joint connection is noticeably faster than current industry practice.
With the removal of the wind turbine all necessary data regarding the Slip Joint connection is successfully gathered and is now being processed and used for validating by the project partners.