The consortium developing the London Array, the world’s largest offshore wind farm, have today announced that contracts have been awarded to MPI and A2SEA to supply marine crew and vessels for the installation of foundations and turbines for the first phase (630MW) of what potentially will be the world’s first 1GW offshore wind farm.

MPI, through a fully wholly owned subsidiary, will supply London Array with the MPI Adventure, a vessel currently being built in China. The state-of-the-art ship will be capable of transporting, lifting and installing more wind turbines and their foundations than current boats. The vessel is expected to start operations in April 2011.

In addition, A2SEA will supply the Sea Worker, a jack-up barge that is expected to be on site from March 2011.

Richard Rigg, Project Director for London Array, said: ‘These are the final major construction contracts to be signed for London Array, which has now moved as a project from the development phase into full construction.

“These vessels are critical to the successful installation of the wind turbines and their foundations and we are delighted to be working with such experienced contractors.’

Once complete, the scheme will be the world’s largest, and the first 1GW, offshore wind farm. Sited in the Thames Estuary, the project will supply enough power for around 750,000 homes – or a quarter of Greater London homes – and displace the emission of 1.9m tonnes of CO2 every year.

London Array will be built around 20km off the coasts of Kent and Essex. The wind farm will be installed on a 245km2 site and will be built in two phases. Phase One, planned to be complete in 2012, will cover 90km2 and include 175 turbines with a combined capacity of 630MW. If approved, the second phase will add enough capacity to bring the total to 1,000MW.

The project consortium partners have the following shareholdings: DONG Energy owns 50%, E.ON has 30% and Masdar has a 20% stake.