Principle Power expands WindFloat® product portfolio, launches WindFloat F

Floating wind industry leader Principle Power has expanded its WindFloat product portfolio to two fully industrialized products: the existing WindFloat tubular design – now called WindFloat T – and the new flat panel, pontoon-based solution, known as the 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 industrialization vision for floating wind.

"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, the WindFloat F. Whether it’s the WindFloat T or the new WindFloat F, we will work with customers to select the right WindFloat for their projects," said Julian Arrillaga Costa, CEO.

The launch of the WindFloat F comes as Principle Power spurs the floating wind industry toward global expansion, where GW-scale projects in diverse geographies place new demands on the supply chain, including more restrictive port infrastructure, the need for serial production, and a need for greater flexibility to incorporate local supply chains into project execution plans.

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

Combining flat panel architecture, widely used in shipbuilding and oil & gas, with proven technology from the WindFloat T, the new design includes the same 3-column architecture and an improved hull trim system. The WindFloat F offers project developers a standardized, robust, and simple design that allows for automated subcomponent manufacturing at existing Tier 1 and Tier 2 fabrication facilities.

"We’ve taken proven flat panel architecture, the 550 GWh WindFloat operational track record, and our state-of-the-art 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," said Seth Price,  Vice President of Technology.

The expanding WindFloat® product portfolio will play a key role in Principle Power’s industrialization vision, called “300x30” – the company’s global strategy to enable the delivery of 300 floating wind turbines by 2030, propelling the industry into the gigawatt scale era.

"Taking our two WindFloat products into the ‘300x30’ industrialization program streamlines fabrication and accelerates assembly in a way that accommodates local supply chains around the world. The new product portfolio, together with our industrialization strategy, is an entirely new way of thinking about efficiency and scale. It’s our vision for a planet powered by floating wind," said Aaron Smith, Chief Commercial Officer.

With 75 MW of capacity in operation and 30 MW currently under construction, Principle Power is the market leader in floating wind technology. The company has secured exclusivity to supply WindFloat® technology to commercial-scale projects totaling 10 GW of projects under design contact and is supporting customers to deliver a multi-GW portfolio of cost-competitive floating wind projects worldwide.