Norwegian energy giant Equinor will temporarily remove all five floating wind turbines from the pioneering Hywind Scotland array later this year after discovering a need for “heavy maintenance” on the Siemens Gamesa machines deployed there, Upstream’s sister title Recharge has learned.

The 6 megawatt turbines will be towed back to Wergeland on the west coast of Norway as part of a maintenance programme that is likely to take around four months and will disrupt power output from the project operating 24 kilometres offshore Peterhead since 2017.