32
GREEN ENERGY
A FIRST
FOR NORTH STAR RENEWABLES North Star Renewables was recently awarded contracts to build three brand-new service operation vessels (SOVs) to support Dogger Bank Wind Farm – the world’s largest offshore wind farm, set to produce 3.6GW once completed. Equinor, SSE Renewables and Eni have partnered in a joint venture to build and operate the North Sea project, located 130km from the Yorkshire coast. As North Star’s first contract within the renewable energy market, this is no mean feat, rapidly repositioning the company as a major player in the field. Matthew Gordon, CEO of North Star, comments on why he feels they were successful: “This is not something we rushed into, having taken the last two and a half years to learn
the renewables market and really understand the challenges. We have the taken time to bring in the right people and meet client requirements by adapting to customer demand. Our comprehension of the sector and its challenges, plus the added value we could offer, combined with our tuned vessel design made us stand out. We have focused on optimising workability, safety, comfort, sustainability and uptime, working closely with our technology partners at each stage to achieve all this and ultimately reducing the fuel burden. As they say, the whole is always greater than the sum of its parts – we took a bird’s eye view; built-in value, improved forward planning and created the opportunity for a workwise operation. With so much planning and investment, this contract is a massive win for the North Star team.”
About North Star
North Star Renewables is part of North Star Group, which also comprises North Star Shipping and Boston Putford. The Aberdeen-headquartered business is the largest offshore emergency support vessel operator in the North Sea, employs 1,400 personnel, and has been supporting the oil and gas sector for the past four decades. It’s offshore support vessel fleet boasts 44 vessels and provides continuous infrastructure support services across more than 50 North Sea installations. By combining safety, service and quality, the company delivers exceptional levels of support to its clients in one of world's most challenging and demanding industries.
www.ogv.energy I May 2021
Halfdan Brustad, Vice President for Dogger Bank at Equinor, is one of many to welcome North Star’s success with this contract as a UK-based organisation: “Despite tough international competition, it is a testament to North Star that they won these contracts. This is an ideal opportunity for the UK supplier to develop its skills, resources and network within the sector, laying the groundwork for a fruitful future while significantly supporting the offshore wind market in the UK. Dogger Bank is at the forefront of innovation, and being able to advance such a ground-breaking project with a local workforce simply adds to what we are all trying to achieve.” As recently announced, North Star will be working with VARD – a global designer and shipbuilder of specialised vessels – to build its new fleet for Dogger Bank. Fraser Dobbie, Strategic Development Director of North Star, offers insight into how the winning vessel design was achieved: “We didn’t want to take an off-the-shelf design from VARD. Our approach was to listen to exactly what the client wanted and with their support, designed a new, unique SOV solution. We believe that our commitment to adding this value made the difference. For example, we considered the logistical flow of how cargo is transported onto and off the vessel, into the warehouse and out to the turbines.
