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Maintenance contract at Golden South wind farm awarded to Sarens

This wind facility, in operation since March 2022, has a total of 50 Goldwind 4.2MW turbines capable of generating renewable energy for 100,000 homes. Forty of the towers have GW155 turbines with 76-metre long LZ blades while the remaining 10 towers have GW136 turbines with 67-metre long blades.

Sarens, among the world leaders in heavy lifting, engineered transport and crane rental services, has been contributing to the maintenance and repair work carried out at the Golden South wind farm in Assiniboia, Sask.

Sarens has been responsible for the disassembly of the rotor and generator of the affected turbines, for which it utilized   a CC6800-1 SH/LH+LF3 S3 crane unit with a main boom of 107 meters and a 15 metre jib with a 15-degree offset, with a capacity of 142 tons at a 22m radius.

In addition, the Sarens engineering team used an LTM1400-7.1 crane  as support to smoothly tail  the 101.5-ton rotors located at a height of 110 meters, and the generators, weighing 102.9 tons.

The company responsible for maintenance, selected Sarens for its extensive knowledge and experience in the wind industry worldwide, as well as its advanced machinery, as it was the only company that could locally supply a crane with a lifting capacity of up to 1,250 tons, with an efficient configuration that does not require derrick or superlift to perform the lifts.

To ensure that the work was carried out under the strictest safety conditions, Sarens’ special case wind analysis procedure was used. In fact, the lifting tasks suffered slight delays due to adverse weather conditions such as strong wind and lightning, which halted operations until the arrival of hoisting windows for the cranes.

The Golden South Wind project actively contributes to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and the fight against climate change by generating energy from a renewable source. In turn, it strongly supports the economic and social development of the region by generating revenues from municipal taxes, payments to landowners, direct and indirect employment and local economic activities.

The project will bring in an estimated $6.25 million in local property taxes over the life of the contract from Saskatchewan’s public electricity provider.