Floating offshore wind — a new generation of giant turbines that sit on platforms instead of fixed foundations — has gone from lab benches to real seas in the space of a few years. In July 2025, Chinese state firms unveiled a 17-megawatt floating turbine they say is designed to survive waves taller than 24 metres and super-typhoon winds, a headline that made many people ask: if a machine can be built to stand up to such extremes, could floating wind be safely and cheaply deployed where hurricanes and typhoons strike? The short answer is: maybe — but only if engineers, regulators and developers solve practical problems that go far beyond a single prototype. According to local government reports and industry announcements, the new 17 MW unit was rolled out for testing and described as able to withstand more than 24 m waves and typhoon-level winds.
The facts behind the headlines matter. Floating turbines have already proven surprising resilience in real storms, and university labs have shown scaled models surviving extreme wave and wind combinations. Yet the risks in hurricane and typhoon-prone seas are not limited to the machine on the water: mooring systems, undersea cables, operations and maintenance, insurance, and the logistics of building and recovering turbines all become much harder when storms reach Category 4 or 5 intensity. A sober reading of the evidence suggests floating wind can be engineered for extreme weather — but wide deployment in hurricane or typhoon zones will require new rules, bigger tests, and clear data on costs and risk. The U.S. and European research agencies and developers are working on those pieces now.
In This Article
- What the Field Tests and Prototypes Actually Show
- Voices From the Sea, the Lab, and the Labs-to-Market Pipeline
- Where Floating Wind Can — and Cannot — Be the Practical Answer, and What Must Change
- Actionable Advice for Governments, Developers and Coastal Communities
What the Field Tests and Prototypes Actually Show
Real sea experience is where the technology proves itself. The world’s first commercial floating park, Hywind Scotland, has generated years of operational data and withstood significant North Atlantic storms since it began producing electricity in 2017. Equinor’s operators reported high availability and noted wave heights in the operational record of up to around eight metres during early production periods, showing the basic spar-type concept can survive rough seas and keep generating power. That does not mean Hywind faced tropical cyclones, but it does mean the floating idea is not just a laboratory curiosity.
Researchers have also purposely pushed models into “worst case” conditions. In an indoor test pool at the University of Maine, engineers ran a 1:70 scale floating turbine through waves and wind meant to represent extreme storms; the demonstration ended with controlled, expected motion rather than catastrophic failure, and project leads said the test was aimed at understanding how very large structures will behave in the ocean. The same research community published hybrid and wave-tank experiments that explore how control systems — for example, “wave preview” or feed-forward controllers — can reduce platform pitch and power fluctuations during high waves. Those lab and numerical findings give engineers tools to design floating systems that actively damp troublesome motions.
Meanwhile, very large single turbines have been announced for testing in deeper, more exposed seas. China Huaneng Group and Dongfang Electric rolled out a 17 MW direct-drive floating unit in 2025 with a 262 m rotor that they said will be tested off Yangjiang and was designed for waves over 24 m and “super typhoon” winds. Announcements like that show manufacturers are designing machines with survivability as a core requirement, not an afterthought — but they are manufacturers’ claims until independent test data from field deployments are published.
Voices From the Sea, the Lab, and the Labs-to-Market Pipeline
Engineers and technicians who work on floating projects are blunt about risks and realistic about progress. “These structures are massive,” Anthony Viselli, chief engineer for offshore model testing at the University of Maine, said after a wave-pool demonstration. “These would be some of the largest moving structures that humankind has endeavoured to create. And there would be many of them.” That quote, from on-the-record reporting, highlights both pride in progress and the scale of the engineering challenge.
From the industry, developers stress that experience from oil and gas — deep-water platforms, moorings and dynamic positioning — gives a head start. Equinor staff highlight how decades of offshore hydrocarbon operations feed into floating wind designs: “Much of the knowledge we have acquired over the course of almost fifty years of oil production can be used in our wind power projects,” a structural engineer at Equinor explained in company materials. But even experienced operators note the economics are still open: floating systems currently cost more to build and maintain than fixed-bottom turbines, so the technical possibility must be married to cost reductions to make deployment in vulnerable regions realistic.
Policy and research organisations are explicit about the remaining gaps. The U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has published assessments showing enormous offshore wind potential in deep waters but also flagged hurricane risk as a primary challenge for Gulf of Mexico deployment. NREL and DOE programs such as the “STORM” research activity are studying how to reduce risks from tropical cyclones, and federal reports recommend region-specific standards and new modelling to capture extreme loading on floating systems. That work is essential: surviving one or two storms is not enough without reliable probabilistic risk models and standards for design, siting, and emergency recovery.
Where Floating Wind Can — and Cannot — Be the Practical Answer, and What Must Change
Technically, floating wind can be engineered to survive very large waves. Laboratory demonstrations, real park operations in exposed seas, and new heavy-duty prototypes support that statement. According to national and industry data, global floating capacity grew rapidly in the early 2020s (for example, new capacity nearly doubled in 2023 to about 231 MW), showing the market is moving beyond single prototypes toward small commercial arrays. But moving into high-risk tropical zones raises additional hurdles.
Moorings and cables remain particularly vulnerable. Extreme waves, shifting seabeds, and hurricane-strength currents can overload anchors and scour cable trenches. Failures here can lead to long downtimes or even the loss of entire arrays. Research and field trials are critical to prove new mooring concepts and dynamic disconnect procedures that would allow operators to safely take turbines offline and recover them ahead of a forecasted storm.
Operations and supply chains must also adapt to extreme weather conditions. Ports, tug fleets, and heavy cranes need to be both available and affordable at scale in regions where violent storms are the norm. Without this logistical backbone, even the best-engineered floating platforms will remain exposed to risk.
Financial security is another barrier. Insurance and lending depend on clear, independently validated data about failure rates and recovery times. In the absence of such data, risk premiums rise, threatening the economic case for new projects. NREL and other research bodies have stressed that hurricane risk modelling and supply-chain planning are among the major blockers for Gulf deployments and similar environments worldwide.
There are, however, practical steps that can be taken now. Developers should accelerate multi-scale testing—from wave-tank studies and medium-scale field trials such as UMaine’s prototypes, to full-scale demonstrations monitored independently. Standards bodies also need to update IEC and regional design codes, adding explicit guidance for floating systems in tropical cyclone climates, including wind, waves, currents, and combined loading. Operators should prepare detailed “storm playbooks” with pre-storm disconnect and tow-to-shelter options, while governments can play a role by underwriting some of the risk-reduction R&D already underway in Europe and through U.S. DOE programs.
As both NREL and DOE publications have stated, coordinated public–private action remains the most effective way to lower technical and financial risks for large offshore projects. Without it, floating wind in storm-prone regions will remain a promising but risky frontier.
Actionable Advice for Governments, Developers and Coastal Communities
Governments in hurricane and typhoon regions should fund independent field trials that target the full problem set: turbine survivability, mooring robustness, cable protection, and recovery procedures. They should require transparent, third-party reporting of test and field data so insurers and lenders can price risk accurately.
Developers should prioritise modular designs that can be towed to shelter or disconnected quickly, and invest in shared regional infrastructure — specialised ports and tugs — that lower per-turbine lifecycle costs. Operators should adopt active control systems and real-time wave forecasting to moderate loads during storms; recent engineering papers demonstrate control strategies (like wave feedforward) that can reduce motion and fatigue on floating platforms.
Finally, communities and fisheries must be consulted early to design lease areas that avoid sensitive habitats and fishing grounds; successful projects to date show that co-operation reduces delays and local opposition.
Learn More: Offshore Wind Could Host Large-Scale Seaweed Farms and Capture Carbon Fast
Conclusion
Floating wind has crossed important milestones: lab models survive worst-case pools, pilot farms prove year-round operation in rough seas, and manufacturers now offer machines claimed to withstand 20-plus metre waves. Those gains matter. But turning that engineering promise into widespread, affordable clean power for hurricane and typhoon regions will take deliberate testing, new standards, resilient supply chains, and honest accounting of risk. If policymakers and industry act together — funding large-scale trials, updating codes, and building regional recovery capacity — floating wind could move from brave prototypes toward a real and stable option for stormy seas. Until then, prototypes and press rollouts are reasons for cautious optimism, not unconditional certainty.
