Auckland
Kaiwaikawe Wind Farm
CLIENT
Mercury NZ Limited, Higgins Contractor Limited
LOCATION
Dargaville, Northland
RILEY TEAM
Luke Gordon, Simon Orgias, Don Tate, Justin Cameron, Anu Thakur and Clyde D'Souza
THE BRIEF
The Kaiwaikawe Wind Farm features 12 of the largest and tallest turbines in New Zealand with a blade tip height of 206m.
Riley provided civil and geotechnical engineering, and site contamination services for the Civil Balance of Plant Works scope, from resource consent through to detailed design and construction verification. This involved geometric design for close to 500,000m earthworks and formation of 15km of new access roads. Riley was also responsible for design of transport route improvements along the state highway and local roading networks, to facilitate the oversized turbine transport vehicle swept paths.
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THE OUTCOME
The transport route improvements proved a challenge to accommodate the 90m long blade transport vehicles through some tight public road corridors. This was overcome through a combination of site survey and investigations, vehicle swept path analysis, 3d geometric design, and geotechnical engineered solutions.
Construction of the wind farm is underway and is planned for completion in 2026.