The flags were hoisted, and there was nothing short of a festive atmosphere at the ferry port in Thyborøn Port. A tour for all interested parties by bus to the site in front of Limfjord's Kaj 3, from where the installation ship DEME Innovation received monopiles and TPs on board, was a great success.
In fact, everything was taken care of, including bus transport to the site with a guide. Afterwards, sausages and soda awaited the visitors, and there were many of them.
Sales and Marketing Manager Tine Jensen Le Breton had found the biggest smile on the day, because the enormous turnout of visitors was a bit of a surprise. Her colleagues in Thyborøn Port had already teased that it would probably be a small turnout.
- They had told me that only 25 people would come, but now we have already had two buses on the tour with 100 people. My colleagues will probably give me a cake, says Tine Jensen Le Breton, very pleased with the number of visitors.
The enormous queue actually indicated that far, far more people find it extremely exciting that the Port of Thyborøn has now begun its career as a shipping port. But it was not only the visitors who made the sales manager so happy.
- The TPs have already come on board and with a little luck, DEME Innovation will sail out tonight. When the customer is happy, we are happy, says Tine Jensen Le Breton, while she hastily orders another bus, so there are three buses to take the visitors on a round trip.
The trip to the site
A few moments later, a bus has already been emptied of the first visitors and filled again with the sales manager as the tour guide.
- DEME Innovations will come in here to pick up monopiles and TPs 11 times. And depending on the weather, we expect it to take about three months to install the 41 wind turbines. Deme Innovation can be here until some time in June, when the ship will continue to Brittany, she tells the packed bus.
The monopiles for the 41 turbines come from Rostock, and the yellow TPs that come on top of the monopiles come from Bladt Industries in Aalborg. That's why two barges are sailing around Jutland to supply DEME Innovation with the foundation parts.
- There are two barges, they sail with four monopiles from Rostock via the Baltic Sea and into Aalborg, where four monopiles are placed on them. Then the barges sail back and around Skagen to enter Thyborøn from the North Sea, explains Tine Jensen Le Breton.
The barges sail down to the Kiel Canal when they have to return to Rostock to pick up more monopiles.
- Unfortunately, the barges cannot get through the Limfjord from Aalborg, she adds.
A wind turbine unloading site is normally closed land that the public is not allowed to access at all. But the Port of Thyborøn, DEME and Vattenfall have jointly opened it to visitors today, and a helicopter is hovering in the air.
- We will take pictures from the helicopter, because it is the first time such a large ship has sailed through here. It is fantastic that DEME believes in us. These are truly deeply professional people who know what they are doing, says Tine Jensen Le Breton and continues:
- The installation itself doesn't take that long, but there is a lot of preparation time. For example, I have had meetings every week for the past year with DEME. They have been given the descriptions of our new harbour entrance by us, because it is so new that it is not on the sea chart yet.
On the site
The bus turns in front of DEME Innovation, and the visitors stream out to see the ship as close as possible.
A man from Ringkøbing wants to know what monopiles and TPs are used for, and Tine Jensen Le Breton patiently explains how it all fits together and ends with:
- It is an assembly kit, where the yellow TPs come on top.
She does not see it as a coincidence that DEME has chosen Thyborøn Harbour.
- DEME has an entrepreneurial spirit, and everything is very carefully planned, says Tine Jensen Le Breton.
DEME Innovation may be the main attraction of the day, but the tour is far from over. The bus continues on the hinterland area, where there is a lot of stone.
- We have used the sand from the harbor dredging to create this hinterland area. Here is 300,000 sq m. for harbor projects. The stones here are also part of the North and South North Sea – they come from Norway. When DEME Innovation is finished, stones will be placed around every single monopile. So we are running two wind projects here at once. We couldn't have done that without that quay, and it was finished in December, so without it we couldn't have run this project, says Tine Jensen Le Breton.
When the bus turns in at the end of the tour so that the visitors can get sausages and soda, the sales manager just wants to tell you how the whole process has been.
- It's nice, because it just has a cool project all the way through, says Tine Jensen Le Breton, before a new group of visitors is ready with questions.
At Thyborøn Port, wind projects are already going incredibly well.
The installation ship DEME Innovation attracted visitors to Thyborøn Port.
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