A consortium of Vinci and Siemens has won a €2.9bn contract from German utility 50Hertz to design, build and install two converter stations to bring wind power from the North Sea into the German grid.

Vinci is participating through Dragados Offshore, a subsidiary of its Cobra IS arm.

The consortium will build an offshore platform to convert electricity from the LanWin 3 wind farm 120km off the German coast from alternating current to high-voltage direct current, which can be transmitted to shore by cable with low losses.

Dragados Offshore will assemble the platform at its yard in Andalusia, Spain.

They’ll also build an onshore station inland at Schwerin to convert the electricity back to alternating current for distribution in the German grid.

Vinci said the system would have a 2GW capacity.

This contract brings to eight the number of offshore converters that Vinci is currently building (see further reading).

Separately, 50Hertz has teamed up with three other German transmission operators, Amprion, TenneT, and TransnetBW, and with Siemens Energy, GE Vernova and Hitachi Energy, to develop multiterminal hubs with direct current circuit breakers.

Tim Meyerjürgens, TenneT, chief operating officer, said 70GW of wind-power schemes are planned in the German North Sea alone.

He added that the integration of so much intermittent generation would increase demands on grid stability and security of supply.

“We are therefore focusing on innovative technologies and are realising a large-scale meshed direct current grid for the first time. Together, we are paving the way for the climate-neutral grid,” he said.