Danish renewable energy company Ørsted understands the power of drone technology very well; so much that it has partnered with UK-based drone operator Skylift to launch what Ørsted says is the largest drone delivery programme ever attempted to offshore wind sites
There will be over 550 delivery flights to more than 400 turbines at four UK offshore wind farms: Hornsea One and Hornsea Two on the east coast, and Walney 1 & 2 on the west coast.
According to the offshore wind turbines developer and operator, this is the largest programme of drone offshore equipment deliveries that has ever been done outside of the military.
Which is a massive commitment, given that the same company was responsible for hauling nearly 5,5 tonnes of drone cargo exactly a year ago. Drones made by FlyingBasket transported several cargo boxes weighing around 85kg each from a ship to wind turbines at Borssele 1&2 Offshore Wind Farm in the North Sea.
The two companies are using the same FlyingBasket heavy-lift cargo drones to transport boxes of critical safety evacuation equipment, which weigh up to 70 kilogrammes, from a ship to the nacelle at the top of each wind turbine at a height of more than 100 metres.
“Normally to deliver heavy loads like this, it would require two crane-lifting operations to get the box to the top of the turbine”, said Nina F. Le, who is heading the project for Ørsted’s team.
“It would also take three people and means shutting the turbine down for up to 6 hours, so we could only deliver one box a day.
“Delivery by drone takes no technicians from their scheduled work, we can leave the turbines running which means no lost power generation and each takes around five minutes which has meant we’ve been able to achieve up to 30 deliveries a day.”
Ørsted has been using smaller drones for inspections of the turbines and has carried out several cargo drone projects so far.
In 2022, the energy company and transport and logistics provider DSV teamed up to carry out tests with the transport of spare parts and tools using long-distance freight drones at Anholt offshore wind farm in Denmark.
The following year, the developer announced that it became “the first offshore wind company in the world” to use giant autonomous drones to transport cargo to wind turbines, after launching a project with Skylift at Hornsea One.
Last year, Ørsted deployed heavy-lift cargo drones for maintenance work at the Borssele 1&2 offshore wind farm in the Netherlands, marking the first time these kinds of drones were being used in an operational campaign after the concept was tested in 2023 at the Hornsea One offshore wind farm in the UK.