Formosa Heavy Industries to supply foundation pin-piles for offshore wind project in Taiwan

Ørsted has announced that it has signed a contract with Formosa Heavy Industries for the manufacture of Wind Turbine Foundation Pin Piles to be supplied to the Greater Changhua South West and South East projects. The contract amount is approximately TWD2 billion (US$65 million).

Formosa Heavy Industries is a subsidiary of Taiwan’s listed company, Formosa Plastic Group. 

The Greater Changhua South West and South East projects are located in Ørsted's Greater Changhua zone - four offshore wind sites located between 35 and 60km from the shore of Changhua County, on the central-west coast of Taiwan, with a total potential capacity of 2.4 GW.

900 MW will be built in 2021 using an Orsted designed Jacket-type underwater foundation. Each foundation will be supported by three pin-piles that are driven into the seabed, forming a robust foundation structure to sustain the weight of the tower and wind turbine system. These pin-piles are mainly composed of steel plates. Each of them will be approximately 90 meters long, 4 meters in diameter and will weigh over 400 tons.

For this contract, Formosa Heavy Industries intends to use the existing equipment of the Mai Liao Factory in Yunlin County. The company also plans to invest in new hardware such as a plate rolling machine, a milling machine, a sandblasting machine, a submerged arc welding machine and facility to deliver the pin-piles by March 2021.

The local Mai Liao Harbour will be used for laydown and shipping of the pin-piles to their final location in the Greater Changhua offshore wind zone.