Design sketch of the offshore converter station. [Photo/ntfabu.com]

The recent completion of the first segment of the offshore converter station of the Rudong offshore wind power flexible direct current (DC) transmission project lays a solid foundation for the project to advance on schedule.

The project, the first ±400kV flexible DC transmission project in China, is being jointly constructed by China Three Gorges Corporation and China General Nuclear Power Corporation.

The construction scale of the Rudong offshore converter station is about seven or eight times that of a conventional offshore booster station. The whole converter station will be assembled on land and shipped to the Huangshayang sea area to the east of Rudong over a straight-line distance of 70 kilometers.

After completion, it will become the largest offshore converter station in the world. It is mainly responsible for gathering the 1,100 megawatts of power generated by the three offshore wind plants of Rudong H6, H8, and H10, converting it into DC with lower loss, transmitting it to the onshore converter station through a submarine cable, and finally integrating it into the Jiangsu power grid.

Compared with alternating current grid-connected and conventional DC grid-connected methods, the flexible DC transmission technology adopted in the project has many advantages and is especially suitable for long-distance cross-sea cable power transmission, renewable energy grid connection, distributed power generation grid connection, and island power supply.