World's largest, most powerful offshore converter station for wind farms put into use

An offshore wind project in south China that set records in transmission capacity has connected its first batch of turbines to the grid, the China Three Gorges Corporation (CTG) announced on Monday.

The Yangjiang Qingzhou Phase V and Phase VII offshore wind farms feature 163 turbines with a combined installed capacity of 2 million kilowatts -- enough to power more than a million average households annually.

However, the farms are located 70 kilometers off the coast of Yangxi County, Yangjiang City in Guangdong Province, a significant distance away from actual power needs.

To address the challenges of long-distance power transmission, the turbines will use the Heart of the Sea Wind facility, or Hai Feng Zhi Xin, or "Heart of the Sea Wind" in English, which boasts the world's highest voltage and largest transmission capacity for offshore wind power.

For the first time, the facility has collected electricity generated by the turbines, raised the voltage, and then converted it to direct current (DC). This allows power to travel hundreds of kilometers underwater with minimal energy loss, making large-scale deep-sea wind power utilization commercially viable.

"The engineering team overcame multiple challenges in the South China Sea, including strong winds and waves, severe salt mist corrosion, and frequent typhoons. We efficiently completed turbine commissioning, underwater cable laying, joint system commissioning, and grid connection tests, ensuring the smooth grid connection and power generation of the first batch of generators," said Gu Pengcheng, an engineer at CTG's Yangjiang branch.

Upon full operation, the projects are expected to deliver about 6 billion kilowatt-hours of clean electricity to the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area annually. This is equivalent to reducing carbon dioxide emissions by nearly 5 million tons every year, contributing the green and low-carbon development of the region.

World's largest, most powerful offshore converter station for wind farms put into use

World's largest, most powerful offshore converter station for wind farms put into use

Both the Israeli and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) sides confirmed that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the UAE and met with UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.

In a post on social media platform X, the Office of the Prime Minister of Israel said on Monday that Netanyahu and his wife visited the United Arab Emirates on Sunday at the invitation of the UAE president.

"The visit focused on strengthening relations between the two countries and on regional challenges. The Prime Minister was accompanied by the head of the National Security Council, the head of the Mossad, the military secretary and the foreign policy adviser," said the post.

The UAE's state-run Emirates News Agency said on Monday that the two leaders discussed bilateral relations and ways to strengthen ties, without providing further details.

Citing officials familiar with the meeting, Israeli state-owned Kan TV News reported that Netanyahu had asked the UAE president to publicly deny reports that he had warned the Israeli prime minister before Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 surprise attack that the group was planning a major operation.

Netanyahu has previously denied receiving such a warning.

In a separate statement, his office denied the report as "fake news," claiming that the visit "focused exclusively on strengthening relations between the two countries and on regional challenges."

Netanyahu traveled to the UAE on a private plane and spent the day there, Kan TV News said.

Israeli PM's visit to UAE confirmed by both sides