Technical Definition of the TetraSpar Demonstrator Floating Wind Turbine Foundation

Abstract

With the deployment of the TetraSpar demonstrator, a significant cost-reduction is realized in the field of offshore floating wind turbines. The TetraSpar floating wind turbine foundation brings a milestone that emphasizes on a modular and fully industrialized foundation that consists of main components already widely available in the current wind energy supply chain. In an effort to provide an open approach to the development of the concept, this paper aims at giving a description of the design in order to enable an educated discussion of different design philosophies and their influence on material usage and production times. The description of the different subcomponents of the system should allow any entity to build a model for comparison and/or benchmarking any of their own findings against this concept. It is the authors’ expectation that this open approach to technological discussion is paramount to obtaining continued cost-reduction in the area of floating offshore wind—for this concept and others.