Principle Power expands WindFloat portfolio, launches WindFloat F

Leveraging 12 years of operational experience, both WindFloat products are market ready, suitable for the next generation of offshore wind turbines, and will play an integral role in the company’s wider industrialisation vision for floating wind. 

Principle Power chief executive Julian Arrillaga Costa said, “This is a major milestone in the history of Principle Power. We have taken the bankable, proven and reliable WindFloat tubular design and leveraged many of its characteristics to develop a patented new design.”

WindFloat F is designed for ultra-shallow wind turbine integration in ports as shallow as 9 m. The additional buoyancy of the pontoons also minimises column diameter and footprint, creating more options within supply chains.

Combining flat-panel architecture, widely used in shipbuilding and oil and gas with proven technology from the WindFloat T, the new design includes the same three-column architecture and an improved hull trim system. 

The WindFloat F offers project developers a standardised, robust, and simple design that allows for automated subcomponent manufacturing at existing Tier 1 and Tier 2 fabrication facilities.

The WindFloat F is compatible with existing automated flat-panel fabrication lines in key markets, opening new capacity for the delivery of floating wind projects. The new version of the floater also uses modular, ‘block’ subcomponent philosophy for columns, pontoons and box braces. Blocks are manufactured in automated serial lines in indoor facilities for high throughput and quality and the concept uses simple geometries for high-density transport and wet/dry storage. 

Principle Power vice president of technology Seth Price said, “We’ve taken proven flat-panel architecture, the 550-GWh WindFloat operational track record, and our numerical models and extended all of it to the WindFloat F. This means we can offer project developers patented products that are bankable from the beginning.”

The expanding WindFloat product portfolio will play a key role in Principle Power’s industrialisation vision, called ‘300 x 30,’ the company’s strategy to enable the delivery of 300 floating wind turbines by 2030.

Principle Power chief commercial officer Aaron Smith said taking the two WindFloat products into the 300 x 30 industrialisation programme will streamline fabrication and accelerate assembly in a way that accommodates local supply chains around the world.