Progress made at sea and on land in 2024

Our latest film looks back on the progress we have made on Sofia Offshore Wind Farm throughout 2024.

To celebrate Sofia Offshore Wind Farm’s achievements over the past year, we have launched a film showcasing the progress of our most ambitious and challenging project yet.

Construction

2024 has been a major year for the construction phase of Sofia. The onshore converter station has developed substantially, with the transformers installed, multiple new buildings erected, and significant cable installation works delivered.

As always, we thank residents for their ongoing patience and understanding as we continue to build the infrastructure for the facility, which is set to produce enough clean energy to power 1.2 million typical UK homes.

Not only did the onshore construction phase move at pace in 2024, but this year saw the installation of the project’s first offshore turbine foundation. The installation marked the start of offshore construction within the array itself and was the first of 100 foundations to be installed at the 593km² array.

The vessel Aeolus is delivering the foundations from the Port of Tyne, leveraging upgraded facilities specifically built for this project.

In July, we launched the new service operation vessel, the REM Power, from our offshore construction base at the Port of Blyth. The REM Power is equipped with advanced facilities designed for the next stage of the project.

And in August, the Offshore Converter Platform – the beating heart of the project – was installed at the offshore array. This massive structure took more than 13 million hours to build, over two and a half years. It’s an incredible milestone this year that was celebrated worldwide across the industry.

Working with communities

The Sofia project supports local communities, by awarding grants to groups and organisations in the project area through the RWE Sofia Construction Community Fund.

This year the project has delivered a range of projects, large and small. This includes supporting a local community centre with essential maintenance, and helping a local running club to keep moving through the darker months by illuminating the coast road between Marske and Redcar with solar-powered lighting.

The Sofia project has made two major donations in the latter stages of the year. We are thrilled to be a platinum sponsor of the new, state-of-the-art training facility at the Port of Blyth, the Energy Central Learning Hub.

We are also delighted to be able to close the year with the announcement of further funding for the North Sea Conservation charity, parent organisation of the Whitby Lobster Hatchery.

Education outreach

To date, Sofia’s wider education programme has directly engaged with over 11,000 learners in the north east. To mark the completion of Sofia’s Champions for Wind teacher training programme in Redcar and Cleveland, a celebration event was held in July to showcase what has been achieved.

Champions for Wind has since launched in North East Lincolnshire, working with a new set of teacher champions, to teach schoolchildren in this region about the range of fantastic  employment opportunities across the offshore industry. Working with local and other education providers is a key part of our long-term strategy to create the workforce needed in the future.

This year, we were also shortlisted at the Global Offshore Wind Awards 2024. The whole team are proud to have come away with highly commended for the Offshore Wind Project of the Year award, and to also have been shortlisted for the Offshore Wind Collaboration and the Environment and Sustainability award.

The environment has been an important factor in our plans, and the Environment and Sustainability category recognised Sofia for recently forming and leading a group of developers to discuss noise mitigation for marine mammals and settled on using bubble curtains for the Sofia project. Meanwhile out at sea we’re also delivering quality environmental mitigation measures, monitoring noise and working with other developers on an underwater bubble curtain, to lessen the impact of construction on marine mammals.

The year ahead will bring challenges, but 2025 will see Sofia Offshore Wind Farm increase activity on both our onshore and offshore converter assets. We’re also excited to soon welcome the turbine installation vessel, the Wind Peak, which will begin installing turbines in the spring.

You can see the full video on the project below, and you can browse our other project videos in our Video Gallery.