Image courtesy of Sarens

 By NOLAN POINTER

PORTSMOUTH, Va. – Logistics and transportation tasks for the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project are nearing completion.

Dominion Energy is the project owner.

Sarens, world leader in heavy lifting, engineered transport and crane rental services, has played a strategic role in this project through its heavy lifting work since it began operations in 2023 at the Portsmouth Marine Terminal. By early April 2026, all operations were completed on schedule.

This project is anticipated to become operational in late 2026.

DEME Offshore is the prime contractor handling offshore logistics. Siemens Gamesa is the turbine manufacturer. Prysmian Group is partnered with DEME to manufacture, deliver and commission the ocean-to-land power cable systems.

Onshore infrastructure contractors include Wilson Construction  Co., Michels Corp., L.E. Myers Co. And MYR Energy Services.

Sarens has been responsible for handling and preparing the key structural components that make up the wind farm’s infrastructure. Thus, it has carried out the load-in and load-out of the wind farm’s 176 monopiles and 176 transition pieces using its SPMTs (self-propelled modular transporters), alongside the handling of pin piles, templates and the topsides of three offshore substations, each weighing approximately 4,000 tons.

To streamline logistics, Sarens’ engineering team developed a support system for the monopiles designed to optimize space in the port and thereby meet strict ground pressure requirements. This advancement made it possible to access any of the monopiles at any time, providing a level of operational flexibility that traditional storage methods could not achieve, and thus enabling the project to stay ahead of the schedule proposed by Dominion Energy.

One of the main challenges faced by the Sarens team stationed at the Portsmouth Marine Terminal was the need to strictly comply with the environmental restrictions imposed on offshore operations. Due to local regulations designed to protect whale migration, any installation work on the wind farms monopiles had to be suspended between Oct. 31 and May 1 of each year. Therefore, thanks to coordination between the teams onshore and those deployed offshore, it was possible to complete all installations one month ahead of the critical deadline, enabling the project to continue uninterrupted and keeping the overall project schedule on track at all times. Despite these limitations, the Sarens team has so far successfully completed more than 740 transports using its SPMTs, in addition to 382 heavy lifts using high-capacity cranes such as the CC8800 crawler crane.

The Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project is the first utility-owned offshore wind farm in federal waters in the U.S. Its construction required the employment of more than 2,000 people, and its operation and maintenance will require more than 1,100 permanent, highly skilled positions.

Once operational, it will help supply clean energy to more than 660,000 households, although it is estimated that during peak output periods this figure could rise to more than 900,000 households, and it will prevent the emission of 5 million tons of CO2 per year—equivalent to taking one million cars off the road. Furthermore, it will be a key component in helping Virginia meet its clean energy law and in helping the U.S. move closer to its national goal of generating at least 30 GW of offshore wind energy by 2030.