Posted on June 1, 2026
Delivered to the Belgian operator DEME, the ship Norse Wind went into operation carrying a 3,200-ton crane, a monstrous piece made to lift and plant wind turbines with blades larger than a football field and bases that weigh as much as a small building into the seabed.
There is a category of ship that almost no one sees, but without which offshore wind energy simply wouldn’t exist. They are installation vessels, floating machines designed for a single absurdly difficult task, planting giant turbines in the middle of the ocean. And the newest giant of this family is the Norse Wind, which has just entered service by DEME.
The number that defines the ship is that of its steel arm. The main crane lifts 3,200 tons, a capacity that allows handling turbines with rotors exceeding 300 meters in diameter and fixing them on monopile foundations that reach 3,000 tons each. To give you an idea, it’s like taking a structure weighing hundreds of cars and fitting it with millimetric precision into a hole in the seabed, with the ship rocking.
How to plant a turbine in the middle of the ocean
The process is one of the most impressive engineering feats that exist today, and almost no one pays attention to it. The ship arrives at the point, lowers giant legs to the bottom, and literally lifts itself out of the water, becoming a stable platform. From there, the crane goes into action, planting the base, assembling the tower, and fitting the blades one by one, all at dozens of meters high, with the wind and tide working against it.
I confess I am fascinated by the logistics of this. Each modern turbine is the size of a lying skyscraper, and the ship needs to transport several such pieces at once, from the port to the park, and assemble them in sequence without stopping. The larger the crane and the more stable the platform, the more turbines the ship installs per trip, and that’s where the Norse Wind makes a difference.
The race for ever larger turbines
There is a logic behind all this gigantism. The larger the turbine, the more energy it generates, and the wind industry is on a climb where each new generation of equipment surpasses the previous one in size. The problem is that a giant turbine requires a giant ship to install, and the old ones simply can’t handle the current blades and foundations. That’s why vessels like the Norse Wind are so strategic, they unlock the next generation of offshore parks.
