Van Oord Wins Taiwanese Offshore Wind Contract

Dutch marine contractor Van Oord said on Wednesday it had won a 500 million euros ($579 million) contract to build a 640 megawatt (MW) offshore wind farm in Taiwan.

Van Oord will design, manufacture and install the eighty foundations for the wind farm, to be constructed eight kilometres (5 miles) off the coast of Yunlin prefecture.

Installation will begin in 2020, Van Oord said, with a capacity of 350 MW connected to the Taiwan power grid that year and the remaining part in 2021.

The project is part of the Taiwanese government's plans to install offshore wind farms with a total capacity of 5,500 MW by 2025, in a push to phase out nuclear energy.

The Yunlin project is the first wind contract for Van Oord outside Europe. The company has worked on dredging and other offshore projects in Taiwan, where it created 250 hectares (617.8 acres) of new land in the port of Kaohsiung last year.

($1 = 0.8631 euros)

(Reporting by Bart Meijer; Editing by Mark Potter)