OWC has identified geohazards that developers should address following a study of the geological conditions of the Polish sector of the Baltic Sea.

This summer, representatives of the Polish government and wind energy industry signed a letter of intent on cooperation for development of offshore wind power in Poland. The goal is to install 28GW of new installed capacity by 2050.

Today, Poland does not have any offshore wind farms, but aims to have installed circa 4 GW of offshore wind by 2030 and is working on a maritime spatial plan that is intended to add additional area for offshore licensing.

“We have identified numerous key potential geohazards such as boulders, shallow gas, geological faults, chalk and lateral variability of the soil conditions with some bedrock depth uncertainty. These are key hazards that developers should build into their site condition evaluations of prospective projects.”

Łukasz Sikorski, head of OWC in Poland.

Overall, offshore Poland is covered by various kinds of sediments, ranging from loam through fine‐grained sand and coarse sands, to gravel and stones, with sediment thickness varying between 50 and 100 meters.

“Although Poland can benefit significantly from a well-established local construction industry that is more than capable of producing foundations such as monopiles and piles, the geology expected at the Polish Baltic Sea areas indicates that the type of turbine foundations to be used here should be carefully assessed.”