Dominion installs first post for offshore wind project

Dominion Energy plunged the first monopile — after the two existing pilot turbines — into the sea floor Wednesday, kicking off construction of the $9.8 billion Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (CVOW) project that will bring 176 turbines 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach.

Installation of the post started mid-morning and was finished by the afternoon. The installation was delayed two weeks because a support vessel’s arrival was late, according to reporting from The Virginian-Pilot. In a May 1 news release, Dominion said it expected monopile installation to begin between May 6 and 8.

The monopiles are the foundation posts of the turbines being erected in the Atlantic Ocean off the Virginia Beach shoreline, starting 27 miles out and extending 15 miles to the east. Expected to be completed at the end of 2026, CVOW will ultimately be 2.6-gigawatt wind farm that will power 660,000 homes.

The Orion, Belgium-based Dredging, Environmental and Marine Engineering (DEME) Group’s heavy-lift vessel installed the first monopile foundation Wednesday. The 272-foot-long monopiles (about the length of a football field) are 31 feet in diameter, and each weigh more than 1,000 tons. When the turbines are fully assembled, each will be about 836 feet high, and each weighs more than 1,000 tons.

“We are proud to partner with Dominion Energy on this landmark project,” Bill White, president of DEME Offshore U.S., said in a statement. “DEME’s Orion vessel … is uniquely designed to efficiently install CVOW’s massive monopiles, all weighing over 1,000 tons. Our talented project team will include skilled American union pile drivers, creating a robust and prepared workforce. We look forward to working with our consortium partner [underwater cable manufacturer] Prysmian to help deliver Virginia-made energy to the commonwealth.”

The foundation posts have been staged at the Portsmouth Marine Terminal since they started arriving by boat from Germany in October 2023. Massive single vertical steel cylinders, the monopiles are manufactured in Germany by EEW SPC, and the trip to ship them across the Atlantic Ocean takes about 2 1/2 weeks. Eight will be delivered at a time until all 176 arrive in Hampton Roads. About 40 are staged at Portsmouth Marine Terminal, and Dominion’s plan is to have 75 to 100 installed by the end of October, according to a company spokesperson.

The project also includes three offshore substations, manufacturing on which began in fall 2022, although installation of the first substation’s topside foundations is set for late 2024 or early 2025 because the structures require underwater work first.

“This is a monumental day for the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind team, who have worked tirelessly to keep this project on budget and on schedule to provide our customers with reliable, affordable and increasingly clean energy,” Robert M. Blue, Dominion Energy’s chair, president and CEO, said in a statement. “We are taking extensive precautions to ensure this project is fully protective of the environment and to protect marine species.”

To that end, Dominion will take a break from installing the wind turbines between November 1, 2024, and April 30, 2025. Because of federal protections for endangered North Atlantic right whales, the Richmond-based Fortune 500 utility can’t work on installing the foundations from November through April. With that restriction, Dominion plans to install the remaining foundations in 2025 and begin turbine installation, which can take place year-round, in the 113,000-acre area of the Atlantic Ocean it’s leasing.

In March, a nonprofit conservative watchdog group based in Falls Church, along with other organizations, filed a federal lawsuit against Dominion, the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the U.S. Department of the Interior and other government bodies to prevent construction of the wind farm. They claim that the project will pose a risk to North American right whales under the Endangered Species Act, but Dominion says that it has “put in place strong environmental protections for this project, and are confident the North Atlantic right whale will be protected.”

A hearing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on the matter has not yet been scheduled, as of Wednesday.