South Kyle Wind Farm begins to take shape as first turbine foundations installed

The construction of South Kyle Wind Farm, located in East Ayrshire and Dumfries and Galloway, has passed a significant milestone with the installation of the first turbine foundations at the site.

The installation of South Kyle’s 50 turbine foundations is a major engineering project. Each foundation requires around 520 cubic metres of concrete, 60 tonnes of steel and a 6m depth of compacted stone. Each foundation will support a wind turbine that stands 149.5 metres high with a 4.8MW capacity, enough to power an average UK home for around 15 hours with just one rotation of the blades.

The milestone comes a year after preparatory works got underway, and marks a shift from the initial construction phase, where the focus was on enabling access around the site and laying groundworks in preparation for the arrival of the first of 50 wind turbine components early next year.

In the past 12 months alone over half a million hours have been worked on site, with more than 60% of the workforce living within the Ayrshire and Dumfries and Galloway area.

Vattenfall’s principal contractor RJ McLeod based in Glasgow, is leading the operation with a number of specialist companies playing pivotal roles in laying the 50 foundations across the site.

Frank Elsworth, Head of Market Development for UK Onshore, said: "Laying the first foundations is a really exciting step forward in the construction of South Kyle Wind Farm, and reflects the excellent progress being made by the construction team over the past year.

"There are hundreds of people working on the site every day, with the majority coming from the local region. There are also more and more local businesses joining our supply chain, highlighting the benefits onshore wind farms can bring to the Scottish economy as we make the transition to net zero."

South Kyle is on track for completion in early 2023, at which point the 50-turbine wind farm will begin generating enough electricity to meet the equivalent demand of approximately 170,000 UK homes annually.