REGIONAL NEWS Exclusive interview with Dan McGrail, CEO of RenewableUK P.12 WIND POWER Exclusive interview with Dan Jackson, Director at Cerulean Winds P.24 HYDROGEN & CCS First major carbon capture project in the Netherlands supported by HydraWell’s innovative technology P.28 WWW.PROSERV.COMRENEWABLES PUBLICATION IN ASSOCIATION WITH REGIONAL ELECTRIFICATIONHYDROGENPROJECTSNEWSMAPWINDENERGY&CCSGEOTHERMALMARINE&TIDALSOLARCONTRACTSEVENTSANALYTICS ISSUE 1 - AUG 2022 READ ON PAGE 4 BYDISRUPTIONDESIGN
For more information about DNV’s vision for supporting companies in achieving their ESG objectives, including protecting the planet, ensuring the safety of their employees and the wider stakeholder community that is touched by their operations, visit www.dnv.co.uk/assurance/ or contact us directly at certificationuk@dnv.com
Spanning an initial 5-year period, the global contract covers eight countries, more than 250 operational and non-operational oil and gas assets and GHG (Greenhouse Gas) emissions verification (EU and UK ETS). In a recent video interview, Arjen Pos, Head of Quality at Neptune Energy, and Myles Stevens, UK Sales Manager for DNV Business Assurance, came together to discuss the drivers behind management systems certification and how forming a partnership approach is beneficial in sharing lessons learned within an organisation, and also for continuing the transformation into a fully ESG-committed company.
How a new partnership with DNV is helping leading independent global energy company Neptune Energy to achieve their ESG roadmap
With teams based in Europe, North Africa and Asia Pacific to deliver its strategic ambitions, Neptune Energy is committed to meeting growing energy demand whilst reducing emissions. A key player in the UK energy arena, Neptune Energy recently announced it will spend more than $1 billion over the next five years securing energy supplies for the UK and speeding the transition to net zero.
DNV is one of the world’s leading certification bodies, providing independent expertise in assurance and risk management, empowering customers so that critical decisions can be made with confidence. In partnering with Neptune Energy, DNV is supporting the company’s adherence to international ISO standards covering environment, energy and occupational health and safety, and helping Neptune Energy to frame its delivery of a best practice approach to ESG. The partnership will see Neptune Energy independently certified to international standards for Occupational Health and Safety (ISO 45001), Environmental Management (ISO 14001) and Energy Management (ISO 50001).
WATCH INTERVIEW
RenewableUK’s new market intelligence service EnergyPulse shows that the global offshore wind pipeline has doubled in the last year, so now we need to consider how we develop markets and scale up the supply chain to drive further growth. Important topics highlighted and discussed at GOW – the UK’s largest event dedicated to offshore wind – included the dynamics and priorities of market reform, with the ground-breaking and globally emulated 'Contract for Difference' regime set for changes to facilitate greater targets for 2030 and beyond. There is also a new global challenge to build up capacity and resilience across the sector and strengthen energy security in the next decade, while continuing to ensure cost reduction and support economic recovery.
The developments in the burgeoning hydrogen economy have also been making large strides and the supply chain is working hard to help the Government achieve its target of 10GW of low carbon hydrogen by 2030, including at least 5GW from green hydrogen production. Allied with advances in geothermal, tidal and solar technology there is lots to be excited about as we seek to increase the Uk's energy security model and keep on track for our net zero targets.
CONTENTS
DAN MCGRAIL CEO OF RENEWABLEUK
The coming months and years will be testing, yet highly rewarding if we are able to work together to find innovative solutions and maximise on the opportunities that present themselves. We look forward to using this publication and collaborating further with OGV Media Group to keep the energy supply chain informed on news, events and opportunities!
Welcome to the first edition of 'OGV Renewable Magazine', the leading quarterly publication for the renewables industry. 'RenewableUK' are delighted to be partnering with OGV Energy Media Group to help communicate industry updates, discuss crucial energy topics and share market insight for the benefit of the entire sector.
WISH TO CONTRIBUTE TO OUR NEXT PUBLICATION? Contact us to submit your interest daniel.hyland@ogvenergy.co.uk COVER ELECTRIFICATIONHYDROGENREGIONALFEATURENEWSPROJECTSMAPWINDENERGY&CCSGEOTHERMALMARINE&TIDALSOLARCONTRACTSEVENTSANALYTICS P.42P.40P.38P.36P.34P.32P.30P.26P.18P.16P.10P.4 3
Evolution not revolution
After her tour of the site, OEUK’s CEO highlighted how Proserv was an “inspiring” example of a business with a long and impressive subsea heritage using its established skill sets “as a foundation to innovate new, exciting solutions for offshore wind”.
Proserv’s renewables strategy has been built on what it does best Dan Hyland, Operations Director, talks to CEO Davis Larssen and Vice President, Renewables, Paul Cook.
COVER
Proserv’s CEO Davis Larssen used the occasion to remark that the energy transition represented a “great opportunity not only for further innovation but to harness our decades worth of experience” to support sustainable energy generation.
Speaking to OGV Energy, Larssen and the leader of his team’s global renewables business, Paul Cook, are quick to reiterate that Proserv’s emerging presence in the offshore wind segment, accelerated by its exciting technology rollout, is a measured, natural “pivot”, rather than a sudden diversification, with Cook choosing the phrase “evolution, not revolution” to summarise the direction of travel.
Larssen observes: “We are focused on innovating the right technologies to solve problems in the renewables space and to propel the transition. In doing that, we are growing our business, future-proofing it for a changing industry, so we can continue to thrive and be profitable, but we are also committed to this because the energy transition is the right thing to do.”
OEUK CEO Deirdre Michie during a visit to one of Proserv’s Aberdeen sites earlier this year (image: Michal Wachucik/Aberdmedia) Hywind Scotland floating wind farm, operated by Equinor (Michal Wachucik © Equinor)
In March, Deirdre Michie, CEO of energy industry trade body OEUK, chose to mark the first anniversary of the publication of the North Sea Transition Deal, a template for how the UK oil and gas industry can move in-step with the changing energy landscape in the coming years, by visiting global controls technology company Proserv at one of its Aberdeen based facilities.
AFEATURENATURAL PIVOT
Larssen references Proserv’s strategic alliances with Synaptec, a key partner in the generation of its highly-regarded holistic cable monitoring system ECG™, and Intelligent Plant (IP), a vital
4 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
“This is about taking what we do now and what we are renowned for, so our years of experience and know-how around control system integration and subsea environments, and applying that in renewables. Developing solutions that can make a real difference around monitoring the performance of critical infrastructure in offshore wind is a cohesive and natural segue for us.”
With the offshore wind industry set for rapid growth over the next decade, requiring close to 150,000 kilometres of new cables to be installed, ECG™ appears both timely and necessary. We are focused on innovating the right technologies to solve problems in the renewables space and to propel the transition. In doing that, we are growing our business, futureproofing it for a changing industry, so we can continue to thrive and be profitable, but we are also committed to this because the energy transition is the right thing to do.
Davis Larssen
Davis Larssen
“Regarding our collaborations with IP and Synaptec, we are taking two embryonic Scottish technology companies and we are accelerating their growth on a global scale by harnessing their expertise and combining that with our own 60 years of energy experience. So, we are driving the development of discrete technologies, and businesses, while advancing the transition.”
Disruptive technologies But if Proserv’s move into offshore wind has been about emphasising a strategic evolution, its initial offerings for the market certainly offer radical and disruptive outcomes.
Cook has overseen the past few critical years of Proserv’s journey into the offshore wind segment, evaluating where opportunities existed for the team to make an impact with its distinct skill sets:
“But as with Proserv’s solutions right across the energy sector, our controls independence, our OEM agnostic positioning, flexibility and scalability lie at the heart of ECG™’s value proposition.”
ECG™ has been described as delivering a step change in subsea cable monitoring providing a level of visibility of condition and integrity, alongside early insights of issues, simply not seen in the sector before.
It has secured a landmark deal on Dogger Bank, a vast North Sea project and the world’s biggest offshore wind farm on completion, while later this year its data analytics capabilities will be applied on Equinor’s Hywind Scotland, the world’s first commercial floating wind asset. But Cook is clear as to the backstory to this impressive progress: “ECG™ is genuinely exciting and presents great potential to asset owners and operators around a host of benefits – from detecting potential cable failures before they become issues and preventing downtime, through to the subsequent gains around effective maintenance planning and targeted deployment of OPEX.
COVER FEATURE element in his team’s development of new digital technology offerings, as being aligned with how his company instinctively likes to build relationships with other parties to deliver gains and products for the market.
Paul Cook
CONTINUES > 5
Industry backing
6 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
“Control, coreoptimisationintelligencemonitoring,and–fourspecialismsto improve efficiencies, productivity and extend life.”
“Our goal is to assist owners and operators with the life extension of their wind farms.”
“This is another great example of how we like to work: integrating our mutual capabilities, taking a potentially disruptive technology and then seeking to innovate a marketable solution that brings an alternative methodology, and real gain, to the sector. Our aim is once more steered by our philosophy around building transparent, OEM agnostic and scalable solutions.”
“What comes next? This will constitute a digital impetus, innovating data analytics solutions applicable right across an entire offshore wind asset with the fundamental goal of supplying highly effective visualisation of performance, connecting everything from the turbine to the cables and foundation, enabling enhanced decisionmaking around operations, maintenance and long-term strategy.
Power of data Larssen and Cook are keen to stress that while ECG™ is central to Proserv’s current renewables offering, the company’s reputation for innovation and partnering are advancing the creation and rollout of further disruptive offerings, with digital technology a vital catalyst. Larssen comments, “Over time, we have seen that our developing use of digital solutions has become one of the key drivers of our own transition into renewables, and this is also bringing new technologies to the market quicker, furthering our footprint in the renewables space.”
“Our goal is to assist owners and operators with the life extension of their wind farms. By utilising intelligence insights into the integrity and condition of infrastructure, via our products, wind farms with an expected life span of 25 years could still be operating a whole decade later. That not only aids return on investment but global policy around combating climate change.”
He suggests that Proserv’s own pivot towards renewables and digital tech reflects the wider market, “We are on our own journey and the Proserv of 2032 will have similarities, and marked differences, to the Proserv of 2022. The same will be the case with the energy mix.
“Oil and gas will remain dominant components of power generation, and our corporate business strategy aligns with that, but at the same time segments like offshore wind will accelerate, becoming increasingly central, and our goal is to substantially grow our own position in the renewables market, leveraging the disruptive technologies that we can offer to support its growth and performance.”
Proserv’s CEO references the latest tie-up for his team with a Memorandum of Understanding signed earlier this month with a technology start-up venture, Ortomation, focused on generating unique real-time optimisation (RTO) software solutions, distinct from traditional “OEM closed” RTO packages, to improve yields and operational efficiencies.
Paul Cook Davis Larssen
Digital tools are at the core of the ECG™ cable monitoring system from its “accessible, intuitive dashboard” to its “predictive insights via data analytics”. As one of Proserv’s key leaders for the company’s pivot, Cook is clear on the route forwards:
Proserv has an unrivalled long-standing reputation for engaging its OEM agnostic design approach to enable its technologies to coexist and be retrofittable alongside existing systems. Such flexibility and independence allow Larssen and his team to push their offerings to both brownfield and greenfield opportunities in offshore wind – and their innovation is ambitious, with the CEO enthusing about the prospect of building “OEM agnostic, retrofittable control systems that really open up data access and can be hugely insightful.”
Cycle of offerings Larssen explains that Proserv’s increasing emphasis on digital technology, and how its services and capabilities are rapidly evolving, has led to a reassessment of how his team defines what it delivers the market: “We provide a cycle of expertise: from control system provision and upgrade to the condition monitoring of performance and integrity, underpinned by the analytics and intelligence insights derived from that process, all aiding the optimisation of assets and critical infrastructure. Control, monitoring, intelligence and optimisation – four core specialisms to improve efficiencies, productivity and extend life.”
COVER FEATURE
A Proserv technician surveys an offshore wind farm
The company’s progress on its pivot has prompted tangible support from the energy sector with ScottishPower Renewables providing industrial sponsorship to the development of ECG™ in 2021, and Equinor doing the same earlier this year. Meanwhile, as the sector gathered in Manchester in June for the cornerstone Global Offshore Wind conference, Proserv announced that Hugh McNeal, CEO of RenewableUK for five years from 2016, had joined its Board of Directors.
“What Hugh gives is vast experience around renewables and therefore a valuable perspective upon our pivot. He can provide questions and challenge us, bringing fresh ideas around driving our new technologies into the sustainable energy market.
7
To receive such an endorsement from a wellknown industry figure seems advantageous for Proserv but Paul Cook gives the bigger picture: “To have Hugh on board is clearly very positive for us but he has got involved precisely because of the progress we’ve been making. He buys into our philosophy, our pivot and he recognises the value we can bring to this segment and how our knowledge and technology innovation, accrued over decades, can enhance operational performance and extend the life of wind farms significantly.”
Davis Larssen frames McNeal’s arrival with an eye to Proserv’s future:
“We are firmly committed to this journey and Hugh’s input is a part of the process to help steer and direct that roadmap on the right path forwards.”
COVER FEATURE Hugh McNeal, former CEO of RenewableUK and Proserv Board appointee Oct 2019 New five-year Proserv technology roadmap is established Oct 2020 Strategic alliance formed with power monitoring experts Synaptec Dec 2020 Strategic alliance set up with data analytics firm Intelligent Plant Sept 2021 Industrial sponsorship for ECG™ from ScottishPower Renewables Feb 2022 ECG™ lands key cable monitoring deal on Dogger Bank Wind Farm May 2022 Industrial sponsorship from Equinor and ECG™ to operate on the Hywind Scotland floating asset this year June 2022 Former RenewableUK CEO Hugh McNeal joins Proserv’s Board of AugDirectors2022 Memorandum of Understanding with technology start-up Ortomation.io Proserv’s Renewables & Technology Roadmap
"ANYmal X can be an autonomous plant surveyor, an on-demand inspector and an important tool to respond to safety incidents,” Gustavo Levin, R&D Manager, Petrobras. Typical ANYmal X inspection missions include visual inspections and automated readouts of analog instruments such as gauges, liquid level, and lever positions, advanced thermography, gas detection and vibration analysis of equipment, as well as 3D scanning of infrastructure. ANYmal X integrates as an end-to-end solution through its software API with asset management software and digital twin platforms such as Cognite Data Fusion (watch demo) and Woodside Fuse for automated reporting.
ANYmal X builds on the advanced mobility of four legs to navigate complex structures
“ANYmal X closes an important technical gap, conducting automated inspections in very complex environments, with stairs and tight passages, and this in combination with Ex-zones, that’s a novelty!,” Peter Welter, Automation Manager, BASF.
ANYmal X, performing repeated autonomous inspection missions at potentially hazardous Oil & Gas and Chemical facilities
The ANYbotics exclusive early adopters program ensures seamless deployment. Developed for strategic customers, the program addresses cross-functional aspects of onboarding ANYmal X and prepares customers for scaling. With a high demand for the limited number of ANYmal X units available in 2023, all program slots were quickly taken by leading Oil & Gas and Chemicals companies.
The ANYbotics team developed ANYmal X with identical performance, functionality and mobility to that of ANYmal (Gen. D), their leading non-Ex inspection robot.
Ensuring availability and safety in operationally intricate facilities requires frequent inspections and detailed monitoring. Often, inspections are performed in or close to potentially hazardous environments. ANYmal X now allows operators in Oil & Gas and Chemicals to include safe, autonomous, and highly mobile robots in their inspection and workforce planning.
“Having ANYmal X Ex-certified up to Zone 1 will really enable us to bring the robot very close to our process area, and that’s where you create value,” Iskandar Al-Thani Mahmood, Manager (Robotics), PETRONAS. For further information, visit the ANYmal X web page, explore ANYbotics’ robotic inspection solution, and reach out to ANYbotics for partnership inquiries. www.anybotics.com
Specifically designed and certified for safe usage in hazardous and potentially explosive environments, ANYmal X is an industry breakthrough and will appear in public for the first time in Europe at the SPRINT World Congress for Inspection and Maintenance Robotics (WCIMR22).
ANYmal X — A Remarkable Engineering Achievement
"Our offshore and onshore assets require Ex-certification in certain areas. Robots moving in these areas would therefore need to be certified. For this reason, we are taking part in the ANYmal X onboarding program,” Anders Røyrøy, Principal Researcher Automation, Equinor. Global operators who signed up for the ANYmal X early adopters program include Petronas, BASF, Equinor, Petrobras, Shell, Schlumberger and EniProgetti
8 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
ANYmal X extends the leading mobility, autonomy, and inspection intelligence of ANYbotics' robotic inspection solution to the Oil & Gas and Chemical industries.
ANYmal X is powered by AI and approved according to the IECEx and ATEX certification standards for usage in Zone 1 explosive atmospheres. The challenge of packing all inspection capabilities and performance into an Ex-proof robot system was a serious undertaking and required ANYbotics to rethink how they develop robots.
Early Adopters Program Drives High ANYmal X Demand
in the spotlight ANYMAL X
ANYmal X Transforms Routine Oil & Gas and Chemical Inspections
THE WORLD'S ONLY EX-PROOF LEGGED ROBOT MAKES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE IN EUROPE
Disclaimer: The views and opinions published within editorials and advertisements in this OGV Energy Publication are not those of our editor or company. Whilst we have made every effort to ensure the legitimacy of the content, OGV Energy cannot accept any responsibility for errors and mistakes. TRAVELOURCONTRIBUTORSPARTNERSMANAGEMENT PARTNER Corporate Travel Management (CTM) is a global lead er in business travel management services. We drive savings, efficiency and safety to businesses and their travellers all around the world. Editorial newsdesk@ogvenergy.co.uk +44 (0) 1224 084 114 Advertising office@ogvenergy.co.uk+44(0)1224084114 Design Ben Mckay Journalist Tsvetana Paraskova OGV ENERGY VIEW our media pack at www.ogv.energy/advertise-with-us or scan de QR code ADVERTISE WITH OGV The key to faster, better decisions RenewableUK’s EnergyPulse is the industry’s go-to market intelligence service, providing comprehensive and accurate energy data, insights, and focussed dashboards for the wind, marine, storage and green hydrogen sectors in the UK and offshore wind globally. Connected to our 400+ member network our experienced team of experts research industry news, contracts, and ownership to ensure you keep grow your business agility by leveraging a suite of user-friendly, intuitive, configurable, and highly-interactive tools. Sign up and keep your finger on the pulse of the UK and global renewable energy markets, accelerating towards a net-zero future. We offer a wide range of competitive subscription levels that can be tailored to suit your business needs. Contact our Head of Membership, Jeremy Sullivan or call +44(0)20 7901 3016 for a personalised consultation. RenewableUK EnergyPulse in numbers* www.renewableuk.com *Number of projects tracked as of 04/08/2022
regional news
The UK Looks To Accelerate Renewables Development
REVIEW
The UK is accelerating clean energy investments and developments as part of its strategy to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 and reduce its dependence on imports of fossil fuels in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Capacity additions of wind and solar energy are growing, while the government looks to support investment in other clean energy technologies, including hydrogen and carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS).
Overall, installed renewables capacity grew by 3.7% in 2021, the statistical report found.
By Tsvetana Paraskova 10 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
The Crown Estate has also identified five broad ‘Areas of Search’ for the development of floating offshore wind in the Celtic Sea – a region rich in natural resources, including world-class wind resource that can be developed with floating turbines. It is intended that these areas will deliver 4 GW of floating offshore wind power by 2035 – kick-starting industry in the region and providing power to almost four million homes, The Crown Estate said. Six fixed offshore wind projects, with the potential to generate renewable electricity for more than 7 million homes, have been given the green light by the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to enter into an Agreement for Lease with The Crown Estate.
Over the past few months, the UK has held its biggest renewable energy auction for a total of nearly 11 gigawatts (GW) of clean energy, and has stepped up funding for research and innovation, as well as support to hydrogen projects.
continues to be the leading wind technology in 2021, accounting for 55% of all wind generation in 2021, the UK government said. Offshore first outstripped onshore generation in 2019, although offshore capacity still lags onshore. Offshore wind plants benefit from coastal winds that generally blow at stronger speeds and for a longer period. Moreover, offshore turbines tend to be newer and larger devices, thus yielding a higher load factor.
Renewable Capacity Set To Soar
Following a record high in 2020, renewable generation declined by 9.3% although 2021 is still the second highest on record. The decrease was mostly the result of less favourable weather conditions, particularly wind speeds, but also sun hours and Offshorerainfall.
“The results back UK’s ambition to increase its renewable energy share to combat the high electricity prices in the country, driven by the spike in natural gas prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. With these awards, we expect annual renewable energy installations in the UK to grow over the next three years,” Rystad Energy says.
The UK’s Fourth round of Contracts for Difference scheme, the biggest renewables auction so far, secured almost 11 gigawatts (GW) of clean energy - enough to power around 12 million homes, the UK government said in early July. The round secured the 11 GW across a range of clean technologies, including offshore wind, solar, onshore wind, and - for the first time ever - floating offshore wind and tidal stream – helping to boost British energy security and independence with cleaner, more affordable and diverse energy created in the UK.
According to the company, solar PV and onshore wind are each set for an annual average installation rate of 2 GW -3 GW between 2024 and 2026. Furthermore, the UK government plans to hold a CfD auction each year starting in 2023, in an effort to further boost renewables, the energy research firm said.
“Offshore wind emerged as the biggest winner with around 7 GW of projects securing CfD, supporting the UK government’s commitment to its goal of 50 GW offshore wind installations target by 2030. Onshore wind and solar PV were included in the auction for the first time since 2015,” Rystad Energy said in its Renewable Energy Insights newsletter from August 2022.
UK
Offshore AcceleratingWind
Installed capacity from renewable sources is set to surge in the coming years as the UK held in the summer its largest renewables auction to date.
Scottish renewable energy projects won contracts for 3 GW to sell their power in this UK auction – at record low prices, Scottish Renewables said. Offshore, two projects off Scotland’s east coast won Contracts for Difference in a competitive UK Government auction process – at just £37.35 per megawatt-hour, 6% cheaper than in previous Onshoreauctions.wind made a comeback with around 1.5 GW of projects awarded, while solar PV secured around 2.2 GW worth of CfD deals, the independent energy research and business intelligence company noted.
In 2021, the UK’s electricity generation mix continued to evolve and move away from fossil fuels and towards renewable alternatives, although renewable generation dropped to 39.6% of generation from 43.2% in 2020 due to less favourable weather conditions for renewable generation, the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy said in its statistical release at the end of July.
11
The 2022 HBM/NZHF Electrolytic Allocation Round aims to kickstart the low carbon hydrogen economy across the UK, helping meet the aspiration of up to 2 GW of low carbon hydrogen production capacity in operation or construction by 2025.
“The Government’s landmark announcement on the way in which British companies will be able to access funding for green hydrogen projects will kickstart the private investment we need to build up a whole new industry in the years ahead. The Hydrogen Business Model operates in a similar way to Contracts for Difference which have turbo-charged the growth of wind energy in the UK and enabled rapid and massive cost reductions. Green hydrogen will add vital flexibility to our future energy system as it can be used in a wide range of ways to replace expensive gas.”
Solar Sector Shines
The government published in August a call for submissions to the 2022 Hydrogen Business Model and Net Zero Hydrogen Fund Electrolytic Allocation Round.
In the solar power sector, the UK currently has around 13 GW of capacity additions in the pipeline, as well as 15 GWac of installed solar capacity, of which utility-scale projects account for 10 GW, most of which is owned by investment funds, Rystad Energy said in a June renewable energy overview. By contrast, the majority of solar projects in the pipeline are led by independent power producers (IPPs) or large-scale developers, Rystad Energy Despitenotes. ongoing supply chain issues and volatile commodity prices which may cause some players to postpone projects, the energy research firm expects the UK’s total cumulative capacity for utility solar will surpass 11 GW by the end of this year. Further out, Rystad Energy estimates utility-scale solar capacity will exceed 23 GW by 2030. Despite the phase-out of the subsidies in 2019, new solar deployment has rebounded since then, after the growth trend had slowed between 2016 and 2019. The rebound was the result of the falling cost of solar panels and increase in development expertise and efficiencies, Rystad Energy reckons.
The UK government has also recently announced more funding for hydrogen projects and Janeresearch.Toogood was appointed in July as the UK’s first Hydrogen Champion, who is expected to play a vital role in bringing industry and government together to realise the government’s hydrogen ambitions. The UK aims to support up to 10 GW of hydrogen production capacity by 2030, aiming to run annual allocation rounds for electrolytic hydrogen, and designing, by 2025, new business models for hydrogen transport and storage infrastructure. These targets are expected to put the UK on track to make it a world-leading hydrogen economy, attracting billions of pounds in inward investment and supporting 12,000 jobs across the country.
The Round is also aimed at supporting projects to deploy at scale at the earliest opportunity, advancing the government’s aim to deploy up to 10 GW of low carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030, with at least half from electrolytic hydrogen production capacity, and to do so at affordable costs by harnessing economies of scale.
Commenting on the recent government announcements to support hydrogen, RenewableUK’s Policy Analyst for Emerging Technologies Laurie Heyworth said:
“We’re looking forward to working closely with the Government’s new Hydrogen Champion, Jane Toogood, on measures to speed up the roll-out of green hydrogen as a clean super-fuel which will help us to decarbonise sectors such as transport and energy-intensive industries where progress has been too slow so far,” Heyworth added.
In recent months electric vehicle registrations are bucking the trend of an overall decline in car sales in the UK amid supply chain issues and a lack of semiconductors, the latest data from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) showed. While total UK new car registrations fell by percent to 112,162 units in July, battery electric vehicle (BEV) uptake grew by 9.9% to 12,243 units to achieve a 10.9% market share for the month. Although this is the weakest monthly uplift recorded by BEVs since the pandemic, overall growth in the year has reached 49.9% to deliver a 13.9% market share, SMMT said.
regional news UK’s offshore industry investments could generate 26,000 new green energy jobs by 2030, according to research by Robert Gordon University (RGU), but only if investment conditions were right.
Funding for Hydrogen Research and Innovation Increases
Innovative biomass projects across the UK were awarded in early August £37 million in funding. A total of £32 million government funding was allocated to increase UK production of sustainable biomass, which can be used as a renewable energy source. Another £5 million goes to support innovative new technologies that will generate hydrogen from biomass and waste.
So, this kind of circular economy thinking is really important in the sector as we go forward. These are the three categories around the ‘Just transition’ that we work on, we track, and that in the future, will be producing more and more analysis on how our industry is performing against those criteria.“
Good morning Dan and welcome to our ‘Lets talk Transition’ podcast series, can you give us an introduction to your organisation, Renewable UK?
How do you define a just transition?
regional news
Look at some of the great impacts we've had in places like Grimsby, which is now the biggest operations and maintenance hub in Europe for offshore wind. If we look at Hull, where Siemens employ a thousand people and are growing their factory there, where they manufacture blades and we are seeing the impact of that on a community, which has suffered from industrial decline, its really important. Then for ‘Planet’, we have to start to pioneer in areas such as green steel. We have to pioneer in things like our marine activity and make sure we transition to zero emission vessels. In the future, we have to make sure that the blades on our turbines are recyclable and that we're not creating problems for the future.
“Its one of those things that often makes me chuckle a little bit, you know, when the industry has its detractors and people say: “Well the wind, you know, sometimes it doesn't blow..” as if the pioneers behind the wind industry didn't know that! - we are aware of the fact that wind is variable and we know that the capacity of wind farms is always going to be dependent on the weather conditions. The weather is predictable, however, it isn't necessarily controllable.
I think the first point where we need to start is that the cost of generating a megawatt hour from an entirely new wind farm that we start building today and start producing electricity from, is going to be a quarter of the cost of putting gas through a power station, which was built 20 years ago. That is the reality. Building new wind farms that costs a quarter of that and half of the cost of a nuclear power station, based on the prices for ‘Hinkley point C’. Therefore, we are already at an incredibly low base, so it makes absolute sense to build an energy system which harnesses as many megawatt hours from wind and from solar at as low a cost as possible.
You also have to recognize the fact that clearly there there's need for storage and we lobbied over a number of years to push for planning reforms to enable grid scale storage, which are now coming through. We are seeing an incredible pipeline of battery projects. I think just last year the pipeline of new grid scale battery projects was about 16 gigawatts and this year it's 32 gigawatts, which doubled in a year and our reports and analysis are available to explain that, but the government is now having to look at how to stimulate investments in things like long duration storage, because clearly it's going to be windier in the winter than it is in the summer.
If we get a business model that works, and the government is consulting on that at the moment, I think the final point I'd make is that we are about to enter into an almost daunting period of major market reform. There's been much talk about so-called REMA – (Review of electricity market arrangements) - the last time we did something on this scale was electricity market reform, which came into force in 2014, but that started in 2008 and 2009. It was a long-term project to really rethink how our markets work and we now have to think about how we get cheap renewable power to Weconsumers.areworking on all of these things. You can see, for example, last month, or a couple of months ago, Dan McGrail – CEO of RenewableUK, takes the hotseat...
Clearly the energy transition will impact on many incumbent industries and therefore we want to make sure we create pathways for people to come out of those industries and into the wind industry, whether that's onshore, offshore, or whether that's in technical roles or in project management or engineering, or in many of the supply side aspects of this industry.
So, from the largest developers and companies transitioning into renewables from oil and gas, right the way through the supply chain to the big manufacturers of turbines and electrical equipment and companies in the Marine sector. About half of our members are active supply chain companies and it's arguably one of the most exciting parts of the energy transition, in the potential growth of supply chain of UK companies.”
Then when we think about ‘Places’, our industry has a really unique proposition in terms of helping rejuvenate local economies, in particular in coastal communities, which have been perhaps declining and need rejuvenation.
“It's a good question and I think to start off, we're an industry very much at the heart of net zero, so social justice and climate justice are very closely linked. I think we can see the impact of the cost of living at the moment and therefore helping to reduce the cost of renewable energy, which has been very much been a part of the story so far, is key and helping the sector to becoming the cheapest part of the electricity generation system is a huge part of that solution, because it means that the energy transition will work for everybody in the end. That means this can’t be a transition which falls unnecessarily on those who can't afford it. Reducing the cost of renewables over the last decade has been a really important part of it and we need to think about the ‘Just transition’ on three different levels: One is ‘People’ one is ‘Places’, and one is ‘Planet’, right? So, starting with’People’, it really is about, jobs and creating employment opportunities. The industry grew from initially being subsidized to now being practically unsubsidized and in many cases there is a facility to pay back to the consumer. Creating jobs out of this for people across the country is an important part of the solution and as an industry we have to set ourselves targets for apprenticeships, for diversity and inclusion and helping workers transition from other sectors.
We have to think about how we transfer demand to match that as well, but also the emergence of green hydrogen is now one of the key pillars in all of this - this offers the opportunity for storage over long term. It also gives us the opportunity to decarbonise the hard to abate sectors and essentially turbocharge net zero.
”‘Renewable UK’ is a membership organization born out of the wind industry, dating back to the seventies. Believe it or not, it started as the British Wind Energy Association and then diversified three times before settling on for the last decade on being called ‘Renewable UK’. We represent about 450 member companies and we're growing because the industry is growing but also because we're increasing our interest in activities beyond wind into sectors like tidal and new technologies such as green hydrogen and the companies we represent are really right across the whole gamut of the industry.
Interview by Moray Melhuish – Founder of Annet Consulting, an Offshore Wind and Subsea Specialist
12 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
I think the industry's still got its detractors though and of course the problem with wind for example, is the storage of the power. Do you think the industry's doing enough to solve that problem and do you think the right incentive mechanisms are in place so that the right innovation and investment is being encouraged and rewarded?
Sign up and keep your finger on the pulse of the UK and global renewable energy markets, accelerating towards a net-zero future. We offer a wide range of competitive subscription levels that can be tailored to suit your business needs.
regional news
RenewableUK’s EnergyPulse is the industry’s go-to market intelligence service, providing comprehensive and accurate energy data, insights, and focussed dashboards for the wind, marine, storage and green hydrogen sectors in the UK and offshore wind globally.
Contact our Head of Membership, Jeremy Sullivan or call +44(0)20 7901 3016 for a personalised consultation. www.renewableuk.com
Offshore wind and the renewables sector are about more than just carbon footprint and cost for Western Europe, with what's happened in Ukraine. To have true energy security for Western Europe, as an industry we have got to speed up the project cycle. How do we do that Dan?
The key to faster, better decisions
Listen to the full podcast interview at: www.ogv.energy/news/podcasts
We are really focused on the tools that we have available to help us to really speed up in the short term. Whether that's increasing the resourcing around the bodies that need to help consent wind farms, creating clearer guidance, speeding up the statutory processes, moving to annual auctions - which is something that we lobbied for a long time, bearing in mind this year's auction, which is released its results it’s just three years since the previous one delayed, partly due to COVID.
So, this is going to need a much more streamlined, dedicated regulatory framework for offshore wind, as it becomes a key part of the UK's economic backdrop. At the moment, you have a scenario where all of this is regulated by different bodies and I think in the future, we may look to bring about a more streamlined approach, maybe similar to the model that's in place in the oil and gas industry. These are the key things to think about on our side, but on the industry side we have to do more work to industrialize. We've got new emerging technologies, like floating offshore wind, which is a great opportunity, but it needs to be industrialized and scaled up. These are challenges that we need to work on. We've got experience in this kind of scaling up process, but let’s not underestimate the significant challenges that are there as well. So, there's things to do on both sides, but the good thing is we're talking to each other, we're working together collaboratively between industry and government.
“Clearly energy security has moved back up the priority list in many respects and the word ‘Trilemma’ has been used more in 2022 than perhaps any of us expected at the end of 2021. That was quite a fashionable thing to talk about a decade ago. Energy security clearly has been a significant issue and our engagement with government during the period immediately after the crisis emerged in the Ukraine was very intensive. We proposed a plan to government to reduce dependence on gas within five years. This industry has always been about scaling up, it's very much in the DNA. So, we know how to do it and we think that we have the ability to deliver at scale, but clearly the limitation has been up to now, how fast you can develop and consent wind farms - and that's a limitation which is coming to really acute sight, during the period we met with the prime minister. We met with other senior ministers during the period after the invasion and talking about how we speed up has been very much a key thing and as a result, the Prime Minister has introduced an offshore champion and an offshore wind acceleration task force, which I vice chair with the energy minister.
13
We have to really speed up that whole process, more regular leasing, more transparency about the roadmap, but I also think as we move towards the next phase of development of the industry in particular, like say maybe post 2030, we're going to be getting into a phase where not only are we consenting new wind farms, but we also start to think about decommissioning some of the first ones and repowering some of the bigger ones.
Vattenfall received funding from the government to do a demonstration of a turbine fully integrated with green hydrogen generation. We saw Scottish Power Renewables announce plans for a major green hydrogen production facility at Felixstowe, Orsted doing something similar with their project, the gig stack project in Grimsby.
There's a lot happening and I think the industry clearly cares about this and wants to work on it and sees there is a huge opportunity. I'm not under playing the problem or the size of the challenge but I also think it can be an overstated challenge because we have the engineering, the capability, and the identified solutions that we need to just work through the cost reduction trajectory and start to deploy at scale, which is really the secret and offshore improves this, the secret of getting it down to a competitive level.”
I think we have perhaps more than ever, a consensus within all political parties and major stakeholders that offshore wind is very much the key to the trilemma, be that on energy security, be it on cost reduction for people or on sustainability.”
Connected to our 400+ member network our experienced team of experts research industry news, contracts, and ownership to ensure you keep grow your business agility by leveraging a suite of user-friendly, intuitive, configurable, and highly-interactive tools.
The European Commission unveiled in May the REPowerEU Plan with a dual purpose to transform Europe’s energy system: end dependence on Russian fossil fuels, which are used as an economic and political weapon and cost European taxpayers nearly €100 billion per year, and tackle the climate crisis.
EUROPEAN REVIEW By Tsvetana Paraskova 14 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
“While the European Union keeps advancing renewables targets, on-the-ground deployment needs to accelerate to meet them,” climate and energy think tank Ember said in a report at the end of July. The EU must double expected middecade wind and solar deployment in a 1.5C scenario, modelling from Ember showed. Last year, the EU deployed 34 GW of wind and solar capacity combined. To reach 1.5C, yearly additions will need to increase, reaching 76 GW in 2026.
Dedicated ‘go-to' areas for renewables should be put in place by Member States with shortened and simplified permitting processes in areas with lower environmental risks, the Commission said.
The European Union and its allies in Europe are looking to develop more low-carbon projects in the coming years in a bid to advance the EU’s net-zero by 2050 target and replace Russian fossil fuels in electricity generation, heating, and feedstocks for Theindustries.EU’sfull ban on imports of coal from Russia already went into effect on August 11, while the embargo on imports of seaborne Russian crude oil and products is expected to kick in next February.
“Europe no longer lacks renewables ambition, but it is now facing an implementation gap. Europe needs to urgently buckle down on removing permitting barriers to unleash the full potential of renewables,”
Needed EU governments have adopted higher renewable energy targets and companies are exploring innovative technologies as Europe looks to significantly increase clean energy deployment as one way to reduce and eventually eliminate its reliance on Russian fossil fuel sources.
The EU also targets 10 million tonnes of domestic renewable hydrogen production and 10 million tonnes of imports by 2030, to replace natural gas, coal, and oil in hardto-decarbonise industries and transport sectors. Finally, a Biomethane Action Plan will be developed to set out tools including a new biomethane industrial partnership and financial incentives to increase production to 35 bcm by 2030, including through the Common Agricultural Policy.
Renewables Acceleration
Yet, the European Commission’s cost estimate of the REPowerEU plan may fall short, a Rystad Energy analysis showed in May. The plan will require at least €1 trillion in investment to meet the core objective of increasing renewable generation from 40% to 45% of total energy supply by 2030. Additional investment will be required to meet targets, including grid and battery storage developments to ensure a stable supply of energy as the whole European power system will need to be restructured, the independent energy research company said.
Meanwhile, Europe is grappling with severely crippled natural gas supply via pipeline from Russia and uncertainty whether or when Russia will turn off the Therefore,taps.apart from looking to replace Russian pipeline gas with LNG, Europe also vows to accelerate the deployment of renewable electricity sources, produce more hydrogen, and develop hydrogen corridors.
“The ambition of the REPowerEU plan is huge. Power companies and energy markets will be looking for details on investments and infrastructure. While the targets are achievable, it will require wartime-like planning, levels of investment, construction, and production to meet goals by 2030,” said Carlos Torres Diaz, head of power research at Rystad Energy.
The EU’s executive arm proposed an increase in the headline 2030 target for renewables from 40 percent to 45 percent under the Fit for 55 package. The increase will include a solar strategy to double solar photovoltaic (PV) capacity by 2025 and install 600 GW by 2030 and a Solar Rooftop Initiative with a phased-in legal obligation to install solar panels on new public and commercial buildings and new residential
“Europe no longer lacks renewables ambition, but it is now facing an implementation gap. Higher targets have not yet translated into accelerated deployment on the ground. Europe needs to urgently buckle down on removing permitting barriers to unleash the full potential of renewables,” said Harriet Fox, Energy & Climate Data Analyst, Ember.
EU’s Plan To Scale Up Renewables
energy transition in motion
The REPowerEU Plan calls for accelerated deployment of renewables.
Forecasts show that by this date, the EU will only be adding 38 GW, half of required annual capacity increases.
Thebuildings.planentails doubling the rate of deployment of heat pumps, and measures to integrate geothermal and solar thermal energy in modernised district and communal heating systems. The Commission is also working to speed up permitting for major renewable projects.
Slow permitting processes also hold back faster deployment of renewables, the thinktank says.
“Deadlines for granting wind and solar permits are being exceeded by up to 5 times,” Ember’s analysis showed.
The EU Energy Ministers have paved the way for faster build-out of renewables and streamlined permitting for wind farms in proposed changes to EU directives expected regional news
Analysts and clean energy think-tanks say that Europe needs to accelerate wind, solar, and all other clean energy rollouts to eliminate Russian dependence and align the continent to a 1.5 degrees Celsius scenario.
“A massive scaling-up and speeding-up of renewable energy in power generation, industry, buildings and transport will accelerate our independence, give a boost to the green transition, and reduce prices over time,” the European Commission said.
Walburga Hemetsberger (Photo: SolarPower Europe)
15
After breaking a decade-long installation record in 2021 with 27 GW, this year is set to see a new record of 39 GW of new European solar capacity, according to SolarPower Europe’s mid-year analysis. These additional 39 GW of solar would replace the equivalent of 4.6 BCM of gas.
“All new wind farms should be permitted in maximum two years. Governments should ensure this deadline covers all permits, including the environmental impact assessment and grid permits,” Dickson added.
Global offshore wind capital expenditure is set to more than double, from $46 billion in 2021 to $102 billion in 2030, with Europe driving the growth, recent Rystad Energy research showed. Capital expenditure on offshore wind in Europe in 2030 is forecast at nearly $53 billion, up from $15 billion last year, Rystad Energy noted. Europe was an early mover in the offshore wind space and currently leads the world with the largest number of installations. With over 26 GW of operational capacity, Europe accounts for more than 50 percent of the global total and is expected to have an installed base of over 57 GW by 2026, the energy research firm says. In solar power, Europe is set to top even the highest deployment projections for 2022 of SolarPower Europe, supporting the region’s push to replace natural gas from Russia.
news
In solar power, Europe is set to top even the highest projectionsdeploymentfor2022 of SolarPower Europe, supporting the region’s push to replace natural gas from Russia.
As investors are increasing investments in wind energy, governments need to facilitate this and ensure they don’t discourage investments by introducing policies which deter investment, Dickson says.
Commenting on the move, Giles Dickson, CEO at association WindEurope, said at the end of June:
“Europe now wants 510 GW of wind energy by 2030, up from 190 GW today. That’s 39 GW of new wind farms every year. Europe will only achieve that if it speeds up permitting. It’s very good that EU Energy Ministers have now agreed to do precisely that.”
“Every megawatt of energy generated by solar and renewables is fewer fossil fuels we need from Russia. European solar is rolling out as fast as possible in anticipation of a difficult winter,” said Walburga Hemetsberger, CEO of SolarPower Europe.
“For this winter, and every winter that follows, Europe needs full focus and attention on accelerating renewables,” Dries Acke, Policy Director at SolarPower Europe, said. “A real challenge the sector is facing is a critical skills shortage - we risk not having the number of installers and project developers that we need. This cannot be overlooked in strategic planning for European energy security,” Acke noted.
regional
to be discussed with the European Parliament in the autumn.
PROJECTSPROJECTS
The EIC is the leading Trade Association providing dedicated services to help members understand, identify and pursue business opportunities globally.
MAP renewable projects SPONSORED BY 16 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
$1 billion BlueFloat Energy has entered the Taiwanese offshore wind market and has announced that it will be developing a 1GW floating offshore wind farm. The project will be located 25km off the coast of Hsinchu County and Hsinchu City, covering 125 sq km, with water depths of around 70-80m. The company plans to enter the project in Taiwan’s Round 3 of offshore wind tenders.
Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners
The EIC provides one of the most comprehensive sources of energy projects and business intelligence in the energy sector today.
TwinUK Hub DemonstratorFloatingProject Hexicon AB & Bechtel $250 million The 30-40MW demonstration project features a twin-turbine floating foundation located in Cornwall. The test site secured a marine licence early this year, and it has now also secured a Contracts for Difference (CfD) award in the latest Round 4 Allocation. The project is the first (and only) floating wind project to secure a CfD (at a strike price of £87.30/MWh) and it will be the first floating wind farm in the Celtic Sea.
GreatOffshoreAUSTRALIAWindFarmEastern
It is renowned for excellence in the provision of services that unlock opportunities for its members, helping the supply chain to win business across the globe.
1 2 3 4
Corio Generation
$1 billion Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) and the city of Barranquilla have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for the development of the 350MW offshore wind farm. The wind farm will be used to produce green ammonia and is set to come online by 2026. The project announcement was shortly followed by the launch of the country’s Offshore Wind Energy Roadmap.
The EIC delivers high-value market intelligence through its online energy project database, and via a global network of staff to provide qualified regional insight. Along with practical assistance and facilitation services, the EIC’s access to information keeps members one step ahead of the competition in a demanding global marketplace. Energy projects and business intelligence in the energy sector
FloatingTAIWANOffshore Wind Farm Hsinchu BlueFloat Energy
BarranquillaOffshoreCOLOMBIAWindFarm
$2 billion Corio Generation has announced its plans for a 2.5GW offshore wind farm. The Great Eastern Offshore Wind project will be located 22km off the coast of the Wellington Shire in Gippsland, eastern Victoria. The project is now in the midst of feasibility studies and consultation with local stakeholders.
www.eicdatastream.the-eic.com 1 11 5 12 3 8 8 2 9 6 10 7 4 renewable
SaharaMOROCCODesert Wind Farm Project Xlinks & Octopus Energy $4 billion
SolarUZBEKISTANPVFergana
PowerLarantukaINDONESIATidalProject
Construction of a 40MW geothermal plant located in Churchill County, Nevada. The project will deliver 24/7 carbonfree electricity from Churchill County to California's regional grid. East Bay Community Energy (EBCE) has agreed to source the 40MW of geothermal energy under a power purchase agreement (PPA) with Fervo Energy. The project is expected to begin operations in Q4 2026. 5
The Uzbekistan government is planning to launch an international tender for the 100MW solar park. The project will be implemented via a public private partnership (PPP). The developer that is selected will sign a 25-year contract and will be responsible for the design, build, financing, operation and maintenance of the solar park - with the inclusion of building the transmission infrastructure. Proposals for the tender will be accepted by September 2022 and pre-qualified bidders will be announced in October 2022.
OffshoreUSA Wind Farm Ocean Wind 1 Ørsted & PSEG $2.5 billion JINGOLI Power LLC and Burns & McDonnell Engineering Company Inc have secured an EPC contract to install two high voltage substations and nearly nine miles of underground cable, that will connect the up to 1.4GW wind farm in New Jersey to the onshore electric grid at two landfall points. The draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) has also been released by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
9 8 11 6 7 10
OffshoreGERMANYWind Farm Gennaker Wpd AG $2.5 billion Wpd has signed a Master Supply Agreement with Siemens Gamesa for the 927MW wind farm in the German Baltic Sea. The 103 turbines will come from the SG 8.0-167 DD family and the deal also includes a 20-year servicing agreement. The tendering process for other main components and installation vessels are currently underway. Full installations will be completed by 2026. It is noted that Wpd’s offshore subsidiary has also been acquired by Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP).
AlUAEAjban
PT Indonesia Power & SBS INTL LTD $100 million SBS Indonesia has completed a three-month feasibility study to determine the suitability of tidal energy resources in the Larantuka Strait and the draft report has been submitted to Indonesia Power and PLN for review. SBS will next conduct a discussion with PLN regarding the draft PPA document and together deliver a finalised PPA document after all terms and agreements are met, as well as achieving FID with interested British and European Investors. This will be followed by the procurement for the FEED activity for the 10MW project.
Government of Uzbekistan $100 million
KarnatakaINDIA Wind Farm Vena Energy $100 million Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy has secured an order from Vena Energy to supply 37 units of the SG 3.6-145 turbines for the 133MW onshore wind farm in Karnataka. The turbines will be manufactured in Siemens Gamesa’s factories in India and installation at the project site is set to commence in 2023.
12 renewables PROJECTS PROJECTSSPONSOREDMAPBY 17
ChurchillUSA GeothermalCountyProject Fervo Energy $120 million
Solar PV Plant Emirates Water and Electricity EWEC $750 million EWEC has invited Expressions of Interest (EoI) for Abu Dhabi's third major solar PV plant - Al Ajban (1.5GW). As of June 2022, EoI documents have been submitted by several companies, including Marubeni Corporation. ACWA Power, Total, Engie, and EDF have also submitted EOI documents, but official confirmation of this has not been made. The successful developer(s) will own 40% of the equity, while the remaining 60% will be owned by the Abu Dhabi government.
Development of a 3.5 GW onshore wind farm in the Sahara Desert, Morocco. The installation will be linked to a 5 GW/20 GWh storage system and electricity will be exported to the UK via an undersea cable.
Whittaker Engineering Ltd are proud to have recently completed the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult (ORE-Catapult) Fit For Offshore Renewables (F4OR) program.
Our 4500m2 modern facility, located close to Aberdeen and our Port facility at Montrose, give our clients a “one stop shop” offering engineering design, fabrication, machining, and mechanical assembly for a wide range of Energy Sector related and renewable services.”
www.naturalpower.com 18 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1 WIND SPONSOREDENERGYBY
“Doing the right thing in an understated style is the true test of engineering integrity, ensuring the details are right at every turn, with every item, consistently guarantees a quality delivery.”
This important accreditation demonstrates that Whittaker is committed to working in the Renewable sector and is confident to show that we are eligible and compliant. Whittaker has a track record in renewables working on a “Met Mast” and “Transition Piece” (TP) project back in 2013 in Eemshaven, Netherlands and in 2021 designing & manufacturing a mooring swivel for a Scottish based tidal project. The manufacturing and fabrication side of the Energy Sector supply chain has many of the skills required to allow a transition to support offshore renewables and specifically floating offshore wind which clearly has many crossover points, regarding mooring, hull design and infield operations and maintenance work. Whittaker are in an excellent position to support the transition with our facilities at Stonehaven and Montrose Port.
Working to create a world powered by renewable energy
Our in-house offshore & onsite field service teams cover a wide range of construction activities, backed up with the knowledge the base can support them fully, wherever the field work is being carried out.
As pioneers of positive renewable change, we continue to contribute to its evolution and growth, creating a better environment for the future of our planet and the generations to come.
We're an independent consultant and service provider, and we only ever work on green energy projects.
With our extensive fabrication and construction operations in Ciudad del Carmen, Campeche, Mexico we will look to replicate the renewable transition in the LATAM market as it develops.
WIND
Whittaker Engineering has been an integral part of the North Sea Energy sector for over 39 years, our unique blend of practical solutions backed up by first principal engineering means we have been one of the “go to” companies since our inception in 1983.
Foundation installation
Ashtead Technology’s growing track record in the renewables sector is attributed to its technical capability and extensive equipment fleet combined with an agile and highlyresponsive approach to successfully delivering marine energy campaigns.
The company are specialists in providing multi sensor multiplexed data solutions and can integrate many sensors over a single optical fibre or copper link allowing sophisticated applications to be rapidly and reliably configured. As part of its high quality service, Ashtead Technology offers specialist technical advice, system integration and mobilisation along with trained and experienced offshore technicians to operate and maintain the systems throughout the duration of a project.
Operations & maintenance
Ross MacLeod, Ashtead Technology’s Integrated Projects Director, said: “It is a really exciting time to be involved in offshore wind and we are delighted to be supporting Saipem on the NnG offshore wind farm project. Based on the breadth of our equipment fleet, technical knowhow and integrated services offering enhanced through acquisitions, we have developed new technology to assist Saipem with this project.
The EDF Renewables and ESB development is due to be fully commissioned by 2023. It consists of 54 wind turbine generators and two offshore sub-stations. As each turbine requires three foundation piles,168 boreholes are being batch drilled in sequence by the Blue Tern jack up Forvessel.theborehole inspection work scope, Ashtead Technology used its in-house design and assembly expertise to develop a bespoke inspection tool that could be deployed from a vessel to inspect and survey the drilled sockets for the foundation piles, to a depth of 100 metres. In addition, the company engineered solutions for dredging the socket base, jet cleaning the upper socket casing, and removing any debris remaining inside the casing anulus before the grouting operation commenced. The grout monitoring scope involved the development of a bespoke autonomous monitoring system with sacrificial grout sensor arrays to enable real time monitoring of the grouting process taking place below seabed level. The system indicates when piles are grouted to the correct elevation within the socket ensuring complete foundation integrity.
Pre-survey & support Ashtead Technology offers an extensive array of packaged solutions covering a range of site survey applications and has a proven track record in optimising and integrating vessel mounted, towed and ROV deployed equipment solutions.
Last year, Ashtead Technology was contracted by Saipem to support various work scopes during the construction and installation phase of the Neart na Gaoithe (NnG) offshore wind farm, in the Firth of Forth. The company was initially awarded a contract for borehole inspection and based on the successful delivery of the initial stages of this campaign, awarded additional scopes to support borehole internal casing cleaning, grouted pile installation and subsequent grout level monitoring.
Ashtead Technology’s range of inspection and monitoring services optimise uptime and reduce operational risks for offshore wind farms. Furthermore, the company’s inspection monitoring solutions also enable the realtime and continuous integrity monitoring of assets to provide early indications of fatigue or failure. Ashtead Technology can also develop custom engineered solutions to solve unique project challenges and optimise operational performance.
SUPPORTING THE NEART NA GAOITHE (NNG) OFFSHORE WIND FARM DEVELOPMENT windSPONSOREDenergyBY 19
WIND
“The increasing work scopes are further evidence of our capabilities and expertise in this sector and demonstrates the confidence Saipem has in our ability to deliver costeffective, reliable and safe solutions.”
Decommissioning With one of the largest fleets of decommissioning tools and systems in the market, Ashtead Technology specialises in ROV tooling, control and monitoring solutions, structure monitoring services, cutting systems and seabed dredging solutions. The company offers a comprehensive service capability for the cutting and removal of renewable energy infrastructure and has a proven track record in the decommissioning of met masts, monopiles, tri-pile foundation structures and export cables.
The company specialises in a range of services throughout the lifecycle of a wind farm, to help its customers assure reliable, affordable and sustainable energy.
As offshore wind farms move to increasing water depths and aim to operate with larger turbines, foundation designs have needed to adapt accordingly. Ashtead Technology specialises in the provision of custom engineered systems and services for offshore wind foundation installation, often delivered in short timescales. The company provides specialist survey, positioning and monitoring services for foundation piling, such as grout monitoring, and a range of specialist cleaning and marine growth removal services to remove hard and soft fouling from a range of structures.
Interview by David Linden – Energy Transition Director for Westwood Global Energy Group out
WIND
It’s a super interesting question and actually one that I was asking myself during the interview process. Going back to the energy security strategy, one of the concepts in there is to accelerate the deployment of offshore wind in the UK and the existing pipeline. The existing pipeline is usually around a decade from lease award through to a financial investment decision and commencement of construction. A decade to twelve years, something like that, so it's a very long period of time and if you think about that in terms of technology evolution, over the last ten years, you may have had several upgrades and iterations of megawatt turbines, so it just feels cumbersome. The security strategy proposed the establishment of a team called the ‘Offshore Wind Acceleration Task Force’, which is a cross-government industry group of people, not a decision-making body, but a body of people which is put together to try and unpack that ten or twelve year cycle, look at bottlenecks, look at friction in the system and see what can be done to ease the path.
Check
Offshore wind is a renewable energy source that is set for dramatic growth. WGEG forecast that today we have just over 50 gigawatts of global installed capacity, which is set to increase to almost 350 gigawatts by the end of this decade.
Well, first of all, one of my overriding impressions of the sector so far, before we get into the technicalities, is people love working in the sector. I went to the Global Offshore Wind Conference in Manchester a few weeks ago and it was one of the most positive experiences of my life. I've never seen an industry that buzzes like this one. People genuinely understand that they're doing something globally significant, working at that sort of complex, interface of climate change, politics, industry and innovation. So it’s super exciting and I've really drank the ‘Kool-Aid’ since then. In fact, I think my wife's got sick of me talking about offshore wind and the challenges it faces. So, going to the UK pipeline, those of you who read the government announcements, may have picked up on the British Energy Security Strategy that was published in April this year. This new strategy is obviously focused on energy security in terms of what we can produce in the UK, for the UK. Wind is abundant, we have something like 880,000 square kilometres of territorial waters, way bigger than any other North European country, multiples of places like Germany and the Netherlands. So, it's an obvious source of zero marginal cost electricity to harness, and the security strategy recognised that by bumping the target up yet again. We've had a target of 30 gigawatts by 2030, then 40 and now we've bumped the target to 50GW with eight years to go, so let's hope nobody bumps it again, because we really are closing in on something very difficult now!
Yes, no problem, David. So, I'm a project development lawyer by training and experience. I've spent about 27 years working with project development teams on large scale energy infrastructure, supporting those teams from conception of the projects, initial MOUs and framework agreements all the way through to financial, close and construction. It's been my absolute bread and butter for well over nearly three decades now, including about ten plus years living in Abu Dhabi in the Middle East. Given the nature of the industry, I’ve been involved in a vast amount of travel to projects all around the world. As you said, I'm relatively new to offshore wind, so I come at this with quite a heavy oil and gas, thermal power, aluminium smelters, refining and petchem type of background. Interestingly Minister Greg Hands, in my first meeting with him, suggested that this was some kind of elaborate carbon offsetting arrangement, where I was now paying some sort of penance for my previous life! - but no, it's been a real pleasure to get stuck into offshore wind!
Yes, I think every second person that you meet who's now in offshore wind was once in the oil and gas sector. So, it's quite a common theme. Let's talk a little bit about offshore wind specifically itself. Many countries in the world have the opportunity to have offshore wind, but it's somehow developed quite quickly here in the UK. Until last year, when I guess the Chinese market overtook the UK, it was the largest offshore wind market in the world. Now we're putting more measures in place to grow this market even further. What is it about offshore wind that's so important here in the UK? Why are we talking about it so much?
Am I remembering that correctly?
Yes, that's correct. I think one of the things I'm keen for people to do, and again, my friends probably don't like me banging on about this, but I think people need to be more connected with the source of generation. I think we've all got very comfortable with the idea that electricity arrives in our homes, it goes into the plug, but you have no idea where it comes from. If you download the ‘National Grid ESO app’ or similar and actually have a look at where it's coming from. It's fascinating, first of all, you see it really shows you what progress the UK has made. Some days you look at that app and offshore wind is up there at 50%. But it also shows you we've got a way to go. There's still a lot of gas-fired power in there and obviously that currently drives the pricing in the wholesale market and there is some reform proposed for that, but we have a way to go before we’re supplying every home with offshore wind. Absolutely, but it's the ambition, that's there. I guess that takes me to my next question around having an ‘Offshore wind champion’. Not many sectors have champions, so why do we need one and also, what role do they ultimately play?
The question on everyone's lips though is how are we going to deliver all of this capacity?
Tim Pick, Offshore Wind Champion for the UK
the full interviewpodcasthere 20 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
So, if you can get the ten or twelve years down to five or six years, then 50 GW becomes more deliverable. So why a ‘Champion’? - I think there's I think there's a couple of reasons for it. First of all, to have someone whose sole focus is on this acceleration agenda and follow up on the work of the task force and secondly, which has actually been more interesting for me, to put someone who's half in and half outside the government system and half in and half outside of industry. In this role, you can have lots of very direct cross-cutting conversations with people at all different levels and with different stakeholders, that ordinarily they maybe find difficult to have with each other, or there's hierarchy issues getting in the way. One of the key benefits in the role is the access you get to all stakeholders at a senior level, which allows you to talk to them frankly and ask them to do things and remind them of their task force commitments.
To give us their perspective on things, David speaks to Tim Pick, Offshore Wind Champion for the UK. Good morning Tim, as you are relatively new to this role, could you provide a bit of background on yourself, how you've got to where you are today and maybe fill in some of those historical gaps for us?
Absolutely, it is that kind of ambition, which is quite amazing. I think other phrases like, ‘Trying to be the Saudi Arabia of offshore wind’, is another one that maybe speaks to the ambition. But I guess the reality, as far as I remember from that document, is targeting enough offshore wind to power every UK home by 2030. Not every bit of power that we require, but certainly every UK home should be powered, or could be powered by offshore wind in theory by then.
She said: “As growth in the renewables market accelerates, we need to ensure we have the structure and capacity to deliver the next step towards our global carbon targets. I’m looking forward to rising to the challenge of the Government targets and pushing the boundaries in renewable energy to play our part in reaching net zero in 2045.”
William joins the business from The Scottish Government where he was Deputy Director for Onshore Electricity Policy, Energy Strategy & Energy Consents, responsible for nationally significant renewable projects and grid Asinfrastructure.amemberof
On joining Natural Power, William said: “We have a very strong team here, with a good mix of developer and policy experience to deliver best in class planning advice to our clients, ensuring both experienced developers and new market entrants secure all the necessary planning consents required.
Natural Power’s planning department carries a broad remit including many critical roles such as environmental consenting services as well as landscape and land agency services and applies to all renewable energy technologies including onshore wind, offshore technology, solar, energy storage and hydrogen.
Jeremy Sainsbury, Director at Natural Power, said: “We’re growing to match the market and restructuring to meet the organisational challenges and specialist skills required to support our clients and the industry. The creation of these new roles ensures focus, and the expansion of our capacity and specialist skills base.”
William Black 21
Upcoming auctions such as the UK’s innovation and targeted oil and gas decarbonisation seabed leasing round (INTOG) and Celtic Sea leasing round, France’s AO5/AO6 auctions and Ireland’s Offshore Renewable Energy Support Scheme (ORESS) will require experienced developers and planning consultants to bring these projects to fruition.
NATURAL POWER BOOST FOR GLOBAL PLANNING OPPORTUNITIES
The offshore wind project pipeline in the UK continues to grow, with 81GW of projects in the pipeline – the second highest in the world behind China – up from 55GW a year ago. With floating offshore wind beginning to feature heavily in the pipeline.
“Natural Power has a strong track record of delivering renewable projects and as the sector continues to grow, we’re really well placed to grow with it as we understand what is needed to develop, construct and operate green energy projects, having done it for the last 25 years.”
As global carbon reduction targets continue to drive momentum in the industry, the leading renewable energy consultancy and service provider, Natural Power, has made two pivotal appointments to bolster the breadth of its planning department as it accelerates support available for client projects.
WIND windSPONSOREDenergyBY
the global leadership team, William is charged with leading Natural Power’s planning department to provide clients with first in class environmental planning advice to ensure their renewable energy projects achieve all the necessary planning and environmental permits to be constructed. Meanwhile, Alison brings with her a wealth of experience in successful project delivery across the UK. She will be focused on growing the already well-established team at Natural Power to support clients throughout the entire lifecycle from feasibility and planning through to decommissioning and repowering. She’ll be responsible for onshore planning projects, across all renewable energy technologies, throughout the UK and Ireland including the onshore elements of offshore projects such as grid connections and substations plus providing oversight on some offshore projects.
In the global offshore market alone, annual installations need to grow to around 70 GW per year to respond to the increase in offshore ambitions driven by decarbonisation targets and energy security concerns, a significant scale up from where we are presently, where 7.5GW were installed offshore in 2021. Similar ambitions can be seen in the UK where the government is strongly backing offshore wind as a solution for decarbonisation, with the 2030 offshore wind targets being increased twice in the last three years; now at 50GW.
William Black has been recruited as Global Director of Planning, and he is joined by Alison Sidgwick as Director of Onshore Planning. These two newly created roles reflect the sustained growth in Natural Power’s planning and consenting services.
Hi Ben, thanks for joining us and can you introduce yourself and your organisation?
“That gave me a really good insight into the kind of ‘On the ground every day issues’ that the industry was facing and I got to know a lot of the people in the industry. Then I finally became CEO of GWEC, following the late great Steve Sawyer just about four years ago.”
“Well, I think the main thing is obviously that we are scaling rapidly and we are getting to this kind of huge industrial size. I mean, we were already getting there when I became head of GWEC, we'd gone through these kind of amazing years where we'd really established the levelised cost of the energy proposition - the value proposition for onshore wind, particularly. We'd got to this point where we were winning tenders openly against oil and gas projects, just on a price basis alone and that was really a new thing.
“What we're seeing now is many, many more countries wanting to come to the table. We launched a United Nations compact along with IRENA last year at the U.N, and that was for 380 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2030 and when we did that it looked very ambitious. We weren't sure if it was really possible, but just less than a year on from that, if you add up all the pledges that have been made, we're actually getting close to something like 370 gigawatts by 2030, which is fantastic."
“It's a remarkable success story. I feel we're only kind of scratching the surface, I mean the space is virtually unlimited, the energy is virtually unlimited. Governments are starting to get round to the opportunity in terms of the cost proposition, the industrial proposition with job creation and the economic benefits.
“That happened just in the couple of years of leading up to me getting this job, so I guess what's happened since then, is that the climate discussion has moved more towards bigger targets and ambitions and the sense of urgency has grown in the climate discussion and that's led governments to adopting even bigger targets.
WIND
“I think the other thing that's happened is investment. I think when I first got involved in the industry 10- 12 years ago, it was like we were still trying to convince people that wind was a good thing to invest in and that it was safe, it was reliable, that it was a good investment proposition.
“Finally, when I took this role, offshore wind was just getting started really. It started in the noughties with the first big projects around that time, but it was still a relatively small part of the overall industry and now it's powered through 20% of annual installations of the whole wind industry and it's going to go to 30% now. It's the fastest growing sector within the wind industry and it's become this reliable, cost effective, competitive industry with investors lining up, which is great.”
“What we are really trying to do is spread the message about wind and advocate for wind power with international institutions, as well as defending the reputation of the wind industry and promoting it. We are looking to create new markets for wind energy around the world by engaging directly with governments and creating the market and regulatory conditions necessary to be able to build a sustainable wind energy business. So those are our kind of two missions really.” Great. And how long have you been involved in the industry?
“Well, I think the first thing is that it's energy at a large scale and the project sizes for offshore wind tend to be much bigger than onshore wind generally, although there are some exceptions.
Interview by Moray Melhuish – Founder of Annet Consulting, an Offshore Wind and Subsea Specialist
"It started in places like Texas in the US, in Brazil and in the tenders in South Africa and Mexico and we really were able to kind of establish this kind of proposition that we could beat other energy sources purely on price competition, so, it was quite a big turning point.
22 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
ben backwell, CEO of the GLOBAL Wind Energy Council (GWEC)
“This has changed 180 degrees. There's probably too much money piling up in many places around the world now, chasing wind energy projects and in fact, probably not enough projects to be able to take in all the money!.
“It's been about 12 years. I actually came from oil and gas and was a journalist for many, many years and was an OPEC correspondent and used to cover energy policy. I also worked as an analyst as well, looking at energy policy and economics in different places around the world and then increasingly got interested in renewables as the wind and solar industry started to become kind of serious industries. I then became increasingly aware of the environmental impacts of oil and gas and got involved in renewable energy journalism and writing about this whole new scene.
“Great to be here Moray and yes, I'm Ben Backwell. I'm the CEO of the global wind energy council, who are basically the representative body for the global wind energy industry. We represent the big corporates in the sector from all around the world and all the associations from Asia, Africa, Latin America, Europe and the United States. Collectively, our membership makes up around 99% of all the wind power installed in the world.
There are some places where they are just a large expanse of land and it's got to get planning permission, but in general, you can do much bigger projects offshore. The other thing is that the technology has advanced in a really incredible way, and we've seen it go from relatively small turbines to these enormous 10, 12, 15 megawatt turbines coming up.
Ben, the latest GWEC report has forecast another 45 gigawatts per year leading up to 2030, so does that take into account energy security and if not, what impact do you think that's going to have?
“That'snonetheless.notgoing to continue in the next few years, so we'll see less from China, but we'll see the rest of the world starting to really ramp up and then China will increase capacity again. The way we see it, around 2024/2025,
Thank Ben, the offshore wind industry added an incredible 21.1 GW in 2021, which is an a amazing result. What do you see as the main drivers behind that growth?
“I then became a campaigner as well and was involved in the COP talks in Paris and helped lead a campaign for the wind industry that resulted in the ‘Paris agreement’. I was then a consultant for quite a few years working exclusively with renewables, wind, and solar companies in things like mergers, acquisitions, the stock market, reputational issues, disputes, all kinds of issues!.
Wow, very impressive Ben and since you've been involved, how have you seen the industry change?
“We had 21 GW last year, which is a huge year, although I’ve got to point out that most of that was in China, who had a phenomenal year - 16.9 GW - so almost 17 gigawatts of wind. That was partly because of the feeding tariff for offshore wind expiring at the end of 2021, so, there was this huge rush, but it's an enormous achievement from the Chinese industry
“Energy security has been a big theme in within the international energy team over the last 12 months and particularly since the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. It's logical and I think wind energy in general does represent the best hope of energy security.”
If it was to be you Ben, I imagine you'd put the five-point plan into action immediately, but is there anything else you'd like to see ? “To be honest, not really. This isn't really specific to the UK, but what we need is to get out of political cycles and we need to get into longer term cycles around building out renewable energy, carrying out the energy
Listen to the full podcast interview www.ogv.energy/news/podcastsat:
“Columbia is another one that's really started trying to get involved in offshore wind and are already looking at how it can develop its sector and there'll be others as well. In Africa there's actually some very good potential in places like South Africa, so, we think that you've got 15 to 20 countries right now pursuing strong ambitions and we expect that number to grow to 30 to 40 countries in the very near future”.
"Success for GWEC is growing the wind industry because we know what an important solution it is in terms of the climate question.
windSPONSOREDenergyBY 23
WIND
"The wind industry has a huge responsibility and a huge challenge because we're going to have to become 10 times bigger than we are at the moment."
“In Europe, with the response to the invasion of Ukraine, you've seen a significant increase in the targets coming from the European commission and the individual countries like Germany, Denmark, France and everywhere else, but also in the UK, there's been this continuous increase of ambition.
How would you define success for GWEC?
you will start to see this really big and sustained ramp up and then you go to sort of 25 GW a year, 28 GW a year, 33 GW a year, 45 GW a year and by the time we get to 2030 where we should be looking at around 50 GW a year, which is a huge amount, but it's still not enough so we'd hope it's more than that!
"Ianywhere.looktopoliticians to be courageous now and to step up and do what's necessary in the mid and the long term."
"Step up and be responsible and think about more than themselves in the next couple of years. So, I think generally we need to build joint narratives and shared narratives. We also need to be courageous enough to stand up against fake news cycles and, and false information that really doesn’t lead anybody
"I think if I can leave the wind industry in a better place than when I found it, when I started the GWEC job, I'd be very happy. We need to somehow crack the climate question and for me my involvement in the industry is really mixed up and it's really connected to my commitment around climate as well.
"Thesetransition.are 10, 20, 30 and 40 year things, and we all need to be agreed on the steps that need to be taken. So, I mean, really my appeal to all politicians is that we don't just look at our immediate electoral interest or our interests within our own parties or where we're going to be in a year's time at the next election, or in two years’ time, we need to look where are we as a collective?, Where are our kids going to be? Where's our society going to be? Are we going to survive climate change? Are we going to be able to continue to thrive as a society? - I know that that's not easy because people's political jobs depend on short-term cycles, but ultimately that's what we need politicians to do.
How would you define success for yourself personally?
Where do you see the main global growth coming from for offshore wind in the future?
As we record this, there's an ongoing contest in the UK to decide who's going to be the next prime minister.
“I think half the growth comes from Asia and a very big chunk of the other half comes from Europe in terms of new growth. Within Europe, there's lots of newer countries that will come into offshore wind and as well as the ramping up of ambition in the established countries, some of that's going to be made possible through floating wind, which will bring on new countries like Spain and Portugal and other places which have just been slower to start, but will catch up.
“Obviously you've got China continuing with its growth and you've got Vietnam, who are putting forward large amounts of offshore wind into its power development plans, but then there's also places like Australia and New Zealand who have really increased their interest in offshore wind as well.
"It's hard to define. Success on one level is that we keep growing as an industry and keep thriving. I mean, the greater and bigger challenge is can we defeat climate change, and can we get to a scenario which is safe for people.
“We're seeing a huge expansion into the Baltic Sea. We'll see big expansion into the Mediterranean as well as the continued development of the North Sea and then Taiwan, which has taken a proactive and aggressive role in Asia, but there's very big markets as well in Japan that really need offshore wind and have established an ambitious target of 45 Gigawatts by 2040.
"I wouldn't be in the wind industry if I didn't think that wind could play a really important role in solving things. So, I mean, success for me personally is, you know, in 10 years time or 20 years time looking at a world that I can see getting safer and more prosperous rather than more dangerous, than I'll be a happy, happy person."
Sustainability is at the heart of our development as it aims to decarbonise oil and gas by producing clean, green energy to electrify platform and produce green hydrogen. With soaring energy prices and a growing reliance on imported oil and gas that comes at a higher carbon price, the energy transition requires oil and gas to be produced while renewable energy is scaled up sufficiently enough to constantly power homes, hospitals, businesses and industries. Taking action now to make the UK’s oil and gas sector’s production the cleanest in the world will remove vast amounts of emissions whilst protecting UK energy security, lowering energy prices and accelerating the green energy revolution, creating thousands of local jobs. Local content is also critical. We have a genuine intent to create major opportunities for the UK supply chain. Delivering the projects that will come out of INTOG and Scotwind will require investment of a scale not seen in the North Sea for decades. Cerulean, along with its main contractor, NOV, are committed to maximising Scottish and UK content in the delivery of its scheme, far exceeding the target of 50% set through the INTOG process. Together, we have been developing a supply chain strategy with the NSTA and have issued a Request for Information to UK companies to ascertain their capabilities and capacity in complete floating foundation fabrication and assembly.
As already outlined, our scheme is fully financed and ready to go. We’ve done the engineering, we’ve engaged with stakeholders, we’ve got our tier 1 contractors in place. We just need the rights to the leases.
24 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
The deadlines set by the North Sea Transition Deal and the quantity of green energy infrastructure required to meet these, mean that there is a very real challenge in terms of delivery scale and speed. There is a need for a production line approach, much more akin to making a car than an oil and gas facility, so that one unit a week is being produced at peak production rates to deliver the total quantity of units needed within the timescales to maximise the potential emissions abatement.
FOUR 1.5GW sites for floating offshore wind - decarbonising Oil and gas production in the North Sea and generating 10,000 jobs. That's an incredible vision. For context, that's equivalent to 28% of new capacity delivered by the offshore wind industry in 2021. What timescales are you working to, and what challenges do you see ahead? The timescales have essentially been set by government in the North Sea Transition Deal whereby the targets are to reduce emissions by 25% in 2027 and by 50% by 2030. Crown Estate Scotland is likely to award the INTOG leases in Q3 of 2023 and developers will have to be at final investment decision (FID) stage in 2024. Our development is bold and ready to go within those timescales.
And with limited fabrication capacity in the UK, every bidder will have to bring in overseas knowhow and capacity to meet the timescales. It is Cerulean’s intention that its partners will help to establish fabrication in the UK and work with the yards here. This will present inward investment opportunities as well as help build out capacity in fabrication in the UK, that will help pave the way for what’s required to deliver Scotwind projects.
How important is sustainability and local content in your design and procurement decision making?
Meanwhile, Cerulean is using all the levers at its disposal to ensure the UK can fully capitalise on the supply chain opportunity. This includes being smart with the floating foundation designs chosen. By using tri-floaters, which can reside in shallow water, fabrication and assembly can happen in the UK.
Dan Jackson, Director at Cerulean winds
Can you please introduce Cerulean Winds to us?
Mark and I have extensive experience in the offshore sector, particularly in deepwater subsea. We’ve held various leadership roles across multinational corporations advising on the planning, construction, and operation of some of the largest offshore projects. We have significant experience managing integrated contracting and project finance to enable funding of major capital projects from the financial markets, including both UK and international development with a variety of commercial models and Build Own Operate Transfer (BOOT) funding constructs.
We are a green energy infrastructure developer, committed to delivering floating offshore wind developments which benefit the environment and the UK supply chain. We have a big, bold proposal, which is ready to go, on scaling the green economy, creating thousands of jobs and making Scotland’s oil and gas production the cleanest in the world.
We’ve been working for over two years on a scheme to decarbonise the UK’s oil and gas sector at pace and at scale, using offshore floating wind to provide green power to electrify North Sea platforms with the excess power producing green hydrogen. We are bidding for four seabed lease sites in Crown Estate Scotland’s INTOG leasing round to decarbonise the UK’s oil and gas sector as this scale will remove more emissions quickly, keep costs lower for platform operators and provide the anchor for large scale North-South offshore transmission.
With well over £6 billion of investment proposed for each 100-turbine site, the scheme would abate tens of millions of tonnes of CO2 in line with North Sea Transition Deal targets.
Who is behind Cerulean Winds?
One of the main challenges is going to be investment in the supply chain. Together, INTOG and Scotwind present a massive opportunity for the supply chain in Scotland and the UK – with many elements in the fabrication and assembly to be carried out in Scotland for the first time. The key question is how do we gear up for this and how much investment can happen in the supply chain in time to meet the timescales? We simply cannot afford any delay as this is all about emissions abatement in a climate emergency.
WIND
Assuming you are successful in your bid - and I sincerely hope you arewhat's the plan to deliver the projects?
Interview by Moray Melhuish – Founder of Annet Consulting, an Offshore Wind and Subsea Specialist
Over the last two years, we’ve been refining and engineering our scheme and have engaged widely with the supply chain. More crucially, we have already locked in our tier 1 contractor partners.
Ultimately, Cerulean’s ambition is to see capacity of UK yards built out so that both fabrication and assembly can take place in the UK, but this is a longer-term undertaking and must be part of an on-going dialogue with industry, government and other stakeholders. A clear supply chain strategy from government will help.
Myself and Mark Dixon founded the business. We have already announced NOV as our main contractor and have a consortium of tier 1 contractors in place as well as a number of industrial and financial partners, leading financial services groups Société Générale and Piper Sandler, who have robustly engaged the financial markets.
The COP 27 Climate Change conference will take place this November, in Egypt. What decisions would you like to see made?
INTOG is a result of government listening to industry and creating the right framework and process for bidding for seabed leases to decarbonise oil and gas. We need greater alignment of regulators, industry bodies and government bodies and acceleration of the consenting process to deliver projects at scale and at pace to tackle the climate emergency and deliver a just transition.
Dan JacksonMark Dixon
Securing all four sites in the INTOG bidding process. This would decarbonise North Sea oil and gas production at pace and at scale in a way that is cost-effective for the operators. Our basin-wide scheme will be good for UK plc – the supply chain and its people - and good for the Afterplanet!that,it’s about exporting our experience and knowledge globally ensuring the UK becomes a world-leader in decarbonisation of oil and gas, offshore floating wind and green hydrogen.
How do you define success for Cerulean Winds?
25
You have mentioned your plans for INTOG offshore Scotland - what other markets do you see as promising for Cerulean?
The biggest challenge was the lack of alignment among key stakeholders. When we designed our development to decarbonise the UK’s offshore sector, there was no alignment among stakeholders – government departments, regulators, industry bodies etc. It was very difficult to know who to speak to about what was essentially the first integrated energy scheme that would decarbonise oil and gas while producing clean, green energy that doesn’t need to feed into the grid. We initially put a proposal to Marine Scotland to acquire seabed leases from Crown Estate Scotland. Following significant consultation with Marine Scotland and Crown Estate Scotland as well as the various oil and gas and energy regulators and other government departments, it was agreed that a competitive process should follow. INTOG was designed as a result to be the vehicle to attract and award schemes that will address the challenges of decarbonising oil and gas, reducing emissions and solving energy transmission.
We hear a lot about Offshore Wind and Green Hydrogen - tell us about your plans in this area?
At the moment we are wholly focused on the UKCS – where there is a high amount of wind and a concentration of subsea expertise for offshore floating wind. Once our development is proven, we will explore other oil and gas basins where there’s a lot of wind! Other governments globally are recognising that the oil and gas industry has to be cleaned up and we aim to prove that it can be done through schemes like ours. In 2022, Energy Security for Western Europe has become a major issue. How can the Offshore Wind industry speed up its project cycle?
It’s essentially all about the regulatory framework and the supply chain. The consenting process needs to be streamlined and accelerated and there needs to a clear supply chain strategy between government and industry to ensure that the right investment is made at the right time so that the supply chain can support the developers with major new projects. What policy changes are needed to make that happen?
How would you define success for yourself personally?
There's an ongoing contest in the UK right now, to decide who will be the next Prime Minister. If it was to be you, what would you do first? Make sure that schemes like ours which address climate change, while securing energy supply, create jobs and opportunities in the UK supply chain are accelerated.
That’s easy – being associated with a major project that drives real change by abating emissions and creating jobs and opportunities in the UK supply chain!
Our scheme uses floating offshore wind to provide clean, green energy to electrify oil and gas platforms. The scale – and basinwide approach - we are proposing makes the project economics appealing for providing affordable green power to the platforms to replace gas and diesel generation through a combination of green electrons from wind and molecules from hydrogen. Power from wind is intermittent. The excess power cannot go into the national grid so our development has been designed to convert the excess power into green hydrogen which can be easily stored and transported. This “bonus” opportunity mans that we will bring largescale hydrogen plants to Scotland which are capable of supplying hydrogen domestically –particularly for industrial use – but also, potentially, for exporting.
What are the biggest challenges you have faced in the Cerulean Winds journey so far?
SPONSOREDenergyBY Moray Melhuish - Founder of Annet Consulting Interested in an interview with Moray? moray.melhuish@ogvenergy.co.ukContact:
The UK has recognised that oil and gas production must be decarbonised. COP27 should mandate that all oil and gas basins must decarbonise. We can demonstrate that it can be done at scale and at pace, making a major impact on emissions abatement. Egypt has a similar oil and gas industry to the UK, in terms of maturity so that would be a good place to agree this. Can you talk us through how you came to found the business? Our DNA is in floating offshore deepwater structures. We’ve got experience in engineering companies at every stage - from FEED through to operation. We’ve also had extensive experience of successfully bringing integrated contracting to the upstream oil and gas sector including contractor-backed project finance. We spotted the opportunity to bring all this experience and expertise to the challenge of decarbonising oil and gas using floating offshore wind.
wind
WIND
the business expanded rapidly and started cooperating with PEG Italy on mechanical services and pipeline opportunities to assist with stabilising 10 pumping Oil Terminals in Basra, southern Iraq. In 2020, it pursued more active engagement with it's customers in helping them to maximise the implementation of a carbon zero strategy.
Hydro-C strives to create a better everyday life innovatively and economically for it's shareholders, while continually improving the business efficiencies and achieving operational Managingexcellence.Director, Hasan Heshmat commented:
up the pace on achieving this. As with many transitioning milestones, the shift towards new technologies takes time and time is currently a luxury that we don’t have. Hydro-C are making the transformation towards greener future and delivers on it's promises and drives the sustainable changes, with their bestin-class services and excellence in execution.
THEANDPROMISESDRIVECHANGE
In 2018
For more
141 582 1213 26 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1 HYDROGEN & CCS HYDROGEN & CCS SPONSORED BY
Creating a lasting positive legacy information contact Hydro-C at +44(0)
Where Hydro-C are focused, is in the green and blue hydrogen. Green hydrogen exclusively uses renewable energy in the hydrogen extraction process. Which is great because we can extract hydrogen in volume with zero emissions. There are a few processes for green hydrogen such as electrolysis of water, using (renewable) electricity the water is split into oxygen and hydrogen.
"We are committed to playing our part in developing green hydrogen production facilities in the UK, EU, GGC and Middle East.
The business strongly believes that introduction of innovative renewable solutions is the only way forward for the energy sector to meet Net Zero targets and for the renewable energy industry to pick WE DELIVER
Everything under the surface hydro-c.co.uk Hydro-C Ltd is a British company with its main Headquarters in the heart of EstablishedScotland. in 2013, it supports international Oil and Gas operators overseas. Our company has followed the model of Shell, which started as a trading company in 1833. Shell first focused on import-export operations then become the company as we know it today. Our main customers are BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Anton Oil, BGC, DNO, refineries and EPCs. In 2018 the business expanded rapidly. We started cooperating with PEG Italy on mechanical services and pipeline opportunities to assist with stabilising 10 pumping Oil Terminals in Basra, southern Iraq. In 2020, we pursued more active engagement with our customers in helping them to maximise the implementation of a carbon zero strategy. We strongly believe that introduction of innovative renewable solutions is the only way forward for the energy sector to meet Net Zero targets and for the renewable energy industry to pick up the pace on achieving this. As with many transitioning milestones, the shift towards new technologies takes time. And time is currently a luxury that we don’t have. We want to add to the success of the energy sector rather than diminish it. We make the transformation towards greener and more We deliver on our promises and drive the change sustainable options easy, with our best-in-class service and excellence in execution. By combining our knowledge with innovative technology and engineering capabilities, we swiftly implement optimised solutions that enable future generations to thrive. We assist with the design and build of high quality assets for our customers that serve to maximise their rate of return on capital invested. Our goal is to create a sustainable future for next generations. Assist the energy sector to catalyse the transition towards renewable energy and help our customers deliver projects that create jobs, grow economies and build greener, smarter world. We also strive to create a better everyday life innovatively and economically for our shareholders, while continually improving our business efficiencies and achieving Hugeexcellence.operationalpartofourtime is invested in building and maintaining alliances with those who share our interests and concentrate on lowering carbon emissions and proactively help to tackle climate change, because we believe in education, enrichment and development. We are committed to play our part in developing green hydrogen production facilities in the UK, EU, GGC and Middle East. To achieve energy security by trading UK major commodities: wind and water, with the rest of the world, we create UK best and largest GH2 advanced hubs to generate circular economy of limitless revenue. For more information, contact us today at +44 (0)141 582 1213 or go www.hydro-c.co.ukto
Creating a lasting positive legacy Hydro-C Ltd is a British company with its main Headquarters in the heart of Scotland.
Established in 2013, it supports international Oil and Gas operators overseas. The company has followed the model of Shell, which started as a trading company in 1833. Shell first focused on import-export operations then became the company as we know it today. Hydro-C's main customers are BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Anton Oil, BGC, DNO, refineries and EPCs.
By combining their knowledge with innovative technology and engineering capabilities, they swiftly implement optimised solutions that enable future generations to thrive. They assist with the design and build of high quality assets for our customers that serve to maximise their rate of return on capital invested.
The goal is to create a sustainable future for the next generation by assisting the energy sector to catalyse the transition towards renewable energy and help it's customers deliver projects that create jobs, grow economies and build a greener, smarter world.
"A large part of our time is invested in building and maintaining alliances with those who share our interests and concentrating on lowering carbon emissions and proactively helping to tackle climate change because we believe in education, enrichment and development.
"Our aim is to help achieve energy security by investing in the UK's major commodities, including wind, water and hydrogen. We are building some of the UK's largest green hydrogen hubs in order to contribute to a circular economy of limitless revenue."
ON OUR
- Combines HR and UHR resolution to provide a much better definition of the overburden; - Enables subtle changes to be identified quickly by comparing current and previous datasets.
Much has yet to be decided, but we’re poised and ready to help the industry take on this exciting new challenge.
Seabed landers continuously monitor the water column to detect any changes that indicate a potential leakage of CO2. The data is relayed in near real time to our network of remote operation centres, meaning that any anomalies are identified without delay, with precise information about their location and rate of leakage.
The offshore CO2 storage industry is in its infancy. Government legislation, standards and insurance requirements are evolving quickly, leaving investors and operators with questions that have yet to be answered. What should the sensors on the seabed landers be monitoring? What are the detection limits for CO2 leakage? What is the recommended frequency for the geophysical surveys? And how frequently should surveys be repeated?
Always on the look-out for leakage Monitoring for potential leakage of CO2 must be carried out at regular intervals throughout the injection phase (which could last for up to 40 years, depending on the capacity of the reservoir) to detect any new fractures or changes in the characteristics of the leakage
The UK has a large capacity for offshore CO2 storage, along with the skills and experience to be able to develop it quickly in the North Sea.
The starting point Operators bidding for offshore CO2 storage licences will rely heavily on site characterisation to provide a framework for managing the containment risks associated with the project. To establish a baseline, they need to be able to understand the overburden model (the multiple layers of rock above the reservoir) from a containment-risk perspective and identify all potential CO2 leakage pathways.
27 HYDROGEN & HYDROGENSPONSOREDCCSBY& CCS
• Oceanographic and environmental sensors –the dissolution of CO2 occurs within the first 4 m above the seabed, increasing the acidity of the water. We use seabed landers, observational tools that are lowered into position on the seafloor and equipped with oceanographic and environmental sensors, to continuously measure, monitor and verify any changes in the marine environment within the vicinity of potential leakage pathways identified in our geophysical surveys.
The principal uncertainty in relation to offshore CO2 storage is modelling and detecting the volume of CO2 that has the potential to leak from the reservoir, migrate up to the seabed and ultimately be released back into the environment.
• Cost-effective, high-resolution 2D geophysical surveys –we combine seismic highresolution (HR) and ultra-highresolution (UHR) bandwidths to achieve a resolution of >0.5 m at a penetration depth of 500 m; and between 3 m and 10 m at 1200 m. Essentially shooting deep and shallow simultaneously. Improved definition in the overburden enables us to identify potential CO2 leakage pathways with far greater precision to optimise location of CO2 monitoring equipment at seabed.
Image of 2D seismic surveys at potential leakage points (data courtesy of Energinet)
GEO-DATAFUGRO’Ssupportsdevelopmentofoffshorecarbonstorage
Conducting a traditional seismic survey is a very expensive operation requiring large technical vessels with a high day rate. In contrast, our cost-optimised solution:
Fugro’s stageapproachinnovativeforthisinitialinvolves:
Fugro seabed monitoring system awaiting deployment
- Is more focused, because the baseline and subsequent data can be used to target identified potential CO2 leakage pathways with a high degree of accuracy;
Carbon capture, usage and storage (CCUS) is now viewed as a key part of the world’s future low-carbon energy portfolio and plays a crucial role in realising emission reduction targets. To accelerate the energy transition in the UK, the North Sea Transition Authority has recently launched a licensing round for offshore CO2 storage on the UK Continental Shelf.
Thepathways.monitoring responsibilities will of course continue long after the CO2 has been permanently sealed in its storage location, deep below the seabed.
Traditional CO2 leakage detection methods are inadequate
- Relies on smaller vessels (which have a lower day rate, use less fuel and require fewer offshore personnel, thereby also reducing cost and safety risks);
The traditional methods to model fluid migration based on oil and gas 3D seismic data do not have sufficient resolution to detect the likely future CO2 leakage pathways. The maximum resolution of exploration and production scale 3D seismic data simply aren’t high enough, being constrained to 5 – 10 m bed resolution.
Looking to the future
The new carbon storage areas, alongside the six licences which have been issued previously, could have the ability to make a significant contribution towards the aim of storing 20-30 million tonnes of CO2 by 2030. Whilst legislation and standards of CO2 storage are evolving, winning bidders will require extensive site characterisation to help plan, develop and operate carbon storage sites safely and efficiently.
The £450m Porthos (Port of Rotterdam, CO2 Transport Hub and Offshore Storage), CCS Project, is a joint venture between the Port of Rotterdam Authority, Gasunie, and Energie Beheer Nederland (EBN). The project forms part of the Netherland’s fundamental goal to reduce emissions.
“As a company, we remain fully committed to ESG best practices and look forward to continuing to leverage our technology to reach our goal of net-zero emissions.
“The campaign was delivered in less than 36 hours, which compared to conventional methods, would have taken up to 7 or 8 days.
FIRST MAJOR CARBON CAPTURE PROJECT IN THE NETHERLANDS
“Our experience in Norway, along with our strong track record in P&A operations underpinned by a well sustainability strategy and a deeper sense of responsibility, will ensure we continue to offer smart, superior and sustainable options which exceed expectations.”
With the support of various cross-sector organisations, the Porthos plan involves the transportation and storage of CO2 from industry in the Port of Rotterdam. The CO2 will be transported through an offshore pipeline to a platform in the North Sea, approximately 20 km off the coast. From this platform, the CO2 will be pumped in an empty gas field. The empty gas fields are situated in a sealed reservoir of porous sandstone, more than 3 km beneath the North Sea.
“By deploying our proprietary PWC® technology, we delivered less operational risk, increased efficiency with optimum results.
Port of Rotterdam
HYDROGEN & CCS
“Our experienced team is committed to developing technologies to transform energy industry operations around the world.
Supported by HydraWell’s innovative technology Norway-based well integrity specialist company HydraWell has applied its cutting-edge technology in the first commercial Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) campaign on the Dutch continental shelf.
Porthos will store around 37 metric tonnes CO2, approximately 2.5 Mton CO2 per year for 15 years.
The Netherlands has clear climate objectives: the emission of greenhouse gases must be reduced by at least 55% in 2030 compared with 1990. By 2050, the Netherlands must be climate neutral.
“This project has demonstrated that our technology can be implemented across a range of cross-sector industries and represents an important advancement in our diversification plans."
“We have discussed carbon capture with only a small handful of clients in the last couple of years so to have supported the Netherland’s first commercial CCS project is a significant milestone for HydraWell,” adds Erlend.
“The successful completion of our latest scope of work in the Netherlands is an important acknowledgement not only of the trust placed in us by clients in the developing carbon capture sector, but also in our team’s ability to step up and seize the opportunity to diversify into fresh and exciting contemporary marketplaces.
Carbon Capture and Storage is currently the fastest way to substantially reduce CO2 emissions into the atmosphere for relatively low costs.
HydraWell Office 28 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
Erlend Engelsgjerd, Sales Manager, HydraWell, says, “This was the first time we had deployed our PWC® technology to complete a CSS project and we are delighted to have been able to showcase the flexibility of our operations.
This nimble and flexible method is much in demand across a range of applications from permanent P&A and slot recovery to restoring annulus integrity and casing shoe repair.
HydraWell’s scope of work involved harnessing its PWC® technology to place a rock-to-rock barrier above the reservoir to prevent Hydrocarbon migration into the sea. The innovative solution was deployed with flawless execution and in a single run.
The Dutch Climate Agreement underlines the importance of CCS for the energy transition. Around 14% of CO2 emissions in the Netherlands takes place in the Rotterdam port area, making the region’s contribution to the national climate objectives extremely important.
HydraWell’s pioneering PWC® system, designed for specialist wellbore applications, provided a ground-breaking solution to complete a significant part of the key environmental undertaking - marking an important milestone for the future of CO2 storage in the Netherlands.
The revolutionary campaign saw HydraWell’s ingenious HydraHemera™ patented Perf, Wash & Cement (PWC®), originally developed to replace traditional Plug & Abandonment (P&A) and downhole tooling techniques, enter new territory thanks to the successful completion of the project in June 2022.
HydraWell’s popular HydraHemera™ portfolio for wellbore specialist applications has played a pivotal role in realising the company’s ongoing drive to re-think existing well integrity operations.
The latest application in the Netherlands is a further clear indication of its adaptability in rising to new challenges.
Mark Sørheim, HydraWell Chief Executive Officer, comments: “As pioneers and problem solvers, we are proactively participating in delivering advanced solutions for future energy needs.
Combined with a sustainable and cost-effective approach, HydraHemera™ was an ideal fit for the Netherlands project.
NECCUS was formed late in 2019, just in time to witness one of the other great cataclysms of our time (Covid-19), as a membership organisation, a platform, and a network by which information can be shared and transferred between all those interested in developing a low carbon industrial future for Scotland, whether they be industrial emitters, academics, professional services firms, or supply chain companies. NECCUS is the central convening body that delivers that convergence.
A series of webinars brings up to date information and allows for members to explain their role and capabilities. Our first major in-person event is being planned for early 2023 where we intend to showcase Scotland’s achievements but also the challenges.
Our members benefit from monthly newsletters setting out policy updates, funding opportunities, and funding calls, project updates in Scotland, updates about other UK and international projects and a list of major forthcoming events. Members also get access to policy makers at government and decision-making level as well as plenty of opportunities to meet like-minded organisations to understand each other’s interest in or progress towards decarbonisation.
And while decarbonising Scottish industry might sound like a simple objective it is, of course, fiendishly complex. NECCUS, with the support of its members manages projects that will allow both a greater understanding of what is required, but also sets out what needs to be done to achieve that. We manage Scotland’s Net-Zero Roadmap (SNZR) project with funding from Innovate UK and major industrial partners to identify pathways to decarbonisation for 28 of the top 30 emitters of CO2 in Scotland. The SNZR project will report later this year. We are also closely involved with Scotland’s NET-Zero Infrastructure (SNZI) project.
You may now rightly ask what has Snow White got to do with it? Very little, except that I’ve mentioned all her dwarves except one, if you want to find out more about that one, or indeed have ambitions to decarbonise then please contact NECCUS through our website.
The industrial energy sector has largely decarbonised, and it is now down to the hard to decarbonise sectors of industry to play their part. Scottish Ministers support NECCUS and the Scottish Cluster in promoting Carbon Capture and Storage. This is seen as mission critical for meeting the targets (the UK Target is Net-Zero by 2050), but also as the primary means to maintaining our industrial base, allowing industry to continue, and importantly maintaining jobs. This will be key to achieving not just Net-Zero but also the Scottish Government’s ambition of achieving a Just Transition too.
Ronnie Quinn CEO NECCUS
Being real about doesdecarbonisationindustrialandwhatSnowWhitehavetodowithitanyway?
In the middle of this record-breaking summer, it’s easy to forget the winter just gone. And while it wasn’t especially cold – we had the Warmest New Year’s Day on record – we did see some extraordinarily powerful winds. Storm Arwen bought havoc to the UK’s infrastructure in November with Storms Dudley and Eunice doing more damage in February. By any measure this weather is weird and getting weirder, so much so that we’d have to go a very long way to find a scientist to disagree with the notion that we are responsible for these shifts in climate patterns through our emissions of greenhouse gases. And with every passing of another weather event, be it hottest, coldest, strongest or wettest there is no time for dopey false equivalence here. The scientific community and governments concur that we as a species need to reduce our emissions before the damage we are self-evidently doing to the planet becomes irreparable. In May 2022 the US National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration documented that its monitoring station in Hawaii averaged 421 parts per million of CO2 for the month. This is about the same level as earth experienced 4.1 to 4.5 million years ago. This is not about saving the planet – earth will endure, changed, perhaps sleepy but continuing. It will be our civilisation that will reap what has been sown over modern times.
29HYDROGEN & CCS HYDROGEN & SPONSOREDCCSBY
Scotland has a world class resource offshore for the safe storage of millions of tons of CO2. Phase 1 alone is planned to store about 150 Mt. This facility will allow not just CO2 from Scotland to be safely stored but also provides the opportunity to reduce costs by shipping CO2 from the rest of the UK and indeed further afield. The UK Government has estimated that at least £15bn will be spent by 2030 by four industrial clusters in implementing CO2 storage solutions. This investment will be supported by up to £1bn of Government funding, which will include commercial business models. We should not be bashful about saying that Carbon Capture and Storage can be operational in Scotland by 2029 with 6 Mt pa being stored rising to 20 Mt pa by 2035. This is an industry and a sector on the cusp of delivery.
The latest published figures for 2020 show that CO2 from regulated industries in Scotland are running about 10.6 million tons per annum (Mt pa). The happy news is that this is down from 26.5 Mt in 2007. For those of a grumpy disposition who say that 2020 was an exceptional year for emissions due to Covid, the data suggests that this is part of a more prominent downward trend. However, more needs to be done for Scotland to meet its world leading target of Net-Zero by 2045.
Scotland has a world class resource offshore for the safe storage of millions of tons of CO 2
AGR is a multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy and software provider. We have the experience, agility and creativity to deliver a compelling solution that solves today’s and tomorrow’s energy challenges. We understand the risks. We manage projects in multi-jurisdictional regions and we understand client pressures to deliver safely, cost-effectively and carbon neutrally.
Speaking about it, Founder and CEO, Karl Farrow said: ‘JUSTLY is one of the world’s largest equity marketplaces for clean tech businesses looking to raise funds for ground breaking innovation and technology.
Formed in June 2020, CeraPhi Energy is the first company in the UK to offer a complete end to end geothermal energy solution around its closed loop technology, from securing finance to full development and build or equity return and – in May –announced it had been awarded a ‘first of its kind’ funded study by the UK Net Zero Technology Centre that will evaluate whether oil and gas wells in the North Sea can be repurposed for geothermal energy.
GEOTHERMAL
30 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1 THE UK’S FIRST END TO END ADVANCED CLOSED LOOP GEOTHERMAL BUSINESS
Speaking about the funding round CEO of JUSTLY Paul Karrlsson – Willis, ‘JUSTLY is all about making an IMPACT now and CeraPhi is doing just that. We are excited to have CeraPhi on our funding platform as they bring CleanTech to life in two incredible ways — firstly, it taps into a geothermal energy source which is always active and, secondly, it can retrofit existing failed or depleted wells, making them productive again in an environmentally friendly way. This also has a social IMPACT by maintaining jobs or bringing them back to geographical areas that need them. JUSTLY is humbled and excited to be supporting CeraPhi with their current $15m capital raise.’ Investors interested in the CeraPhi Energy business are invited to visit the JUSTLY site for more information investjustly.com/all-investments
‘An equity raise, using this platform, builds on the foundations we’ve already established, enables us to support the rapid growth we’re experiencing and means we can meet the huge demand for this clean energy solution.
CeraPhi Energy located in Great Yarmouth, announced it has launched a funding round as the business prepares for exponential growth T he funding round for the Geothermal Energy business has seen the company launch on JUSTLY as it looks to raise capital of $15million through its US platform with plans to expand its operations overseas.
Everything under the surface agr.com
Geothermal – as a viable energy solution –is attracting significant interest across the globe. This equity raise will enable us to, not only, scale to meet this worldwide demand, but also to demonstrate that Geothermal is a real and serious player in the baseload clean energy mix.’
SPONSOREDGEOTHERMALBY
The business has enlisted Petrofac as its industry partner in the study which will focus on decarbonisation of the EnQuest Magnus Platform in the UK North Sea.
Energy transition is an often-overused phrase. However, the conventional energy sector is ideally placed to leverage their technical skills to develop emerging geothermal projects.
The term “Geothermal Decade” was coined to capture the predicted exponential growth of geothermal energy projects from 2020 to 2030. Geothermal power generation was in place 10 years before the outbreak of World War 1, so why has it taken so long to achieve significant growth projections? Capital investment is high, so the ROI is correspondingly longer. However, one of the main challenges has been around risk, both from a general technical and resource aspect.
Roemex’s background in chemically mitigating corrosion and flow assurance in the oil and gas sector means we have the technical expertise to solve many of the operational challenges that HSA projects experience. We were driven by the need for Energy Transition and started our diversification journey in 2017. Today we have a range of products for both the offshore wind sector (fixed and floating) and for geothermal projects. Geothermal brines, like oilfield produced water, have a corrosion and scaling potential. The provision of green chemistries to mitigate corrosion and to maintain a healthy flowing system is only half of the picture. That
O ne of the oldest energy resources of them all, heat from the Earth’s core, it’s been harnessed since the turn of the last century with the first power project realised in 1904 in Italy. A steam powered generator produced enough sustainable electricity to power five light bulbs. Since then, the geothermal power industry has grown significantly, albeit gradually, since that first project generated 10 kW of electricity. At the time of writing, it is estimated that just under 16 million kW of electrical power is generated globally, with North America the biggest single contributor, accounting for 24% of the total installed capacity. Most of these projects are in the Pacific Ring of Fire, a term used for the extremely hot volcanic resource that resides beneath our feet.
31 ARE WE
Heat from the Earth is one of the few zero carbon power and heat sources that can provide reliable and sustainable base load energy. Especially with recent geopolitical factors, our national energy security and independence is high on the agenda.
To conclude; yes, we are in the “Geothermal Decade”, and we need to embrace it. If we collaborate, package complimentary products and services, it won’t just be us as the energy industry that benefit. After all, we will all be contributing to a greater cause, a phase shift that will secure the energy needs for future generations.
For the most part, the resource in Northern Europe is Hot Sedimentary Aquifers (HSA). There are some exceptions, most notably in the UK, but drilling holes in the Earth and flowing a hot liquid to surface is what upstream oil and gas have been doing, in some of the harshest locations on the planet, for over a hundred years.
Heat and CHP projects are well established in this area and the investment is driving exponential growth in the sector.
expertise, acquired through 40 years working in the North Sea, has enabled us to provide a holistic service, with management of integrity and flow assurance. The market in Europe is important for us, therefore in June 2022 Roemex opened a regional office in the Netherlands to support our clients in country and use this as a base to support neighbouring European countries. Government investment and commitment to expansion of baseload geothermal heat and CHP projects will result in installed capacity increasing exponentially in the very near future. New projects are regularly being sanctioned in the Press and there is a sense of excitement and being on the cusp of a new era. One of these indirect benefits is the opportunity to extract battery grade lithium from some geothermal brines. Lithium production needs to quadruple from 20202030 to meet demand, predominantly for electric vehicle manufacture. The extraction of lithium from geothermal brine not only is an additional benefit but significantly reduces risk for the geothermal project with a correspondingly faster increase in ROI.
GEOTHERMALGEOTHERMALSPONSOREDBY
David Halliday Business & Commercial Manager Roemex Ltd. REALLY IN THE GEOTHERMAL DECADE?
By 2030, the market for Power Plants, Combined Heat & Power plants (CHP) and Heat Projects will be thirteen times larger than it is Traditionallytoday.exploited resources in volcanic regions will grow. However, more interestingly, to deliver on Net Zero carbon targets, investment support and technology advancement will have a profound effect on the commercialisation of more marginal projects. In Northern Europe, UK and Scandinavia, our geothermal resource is deeper, more challenging to exploit and is significantly cooler. Despite this, we have a thriving deep geothermal movement.
With focus on innovation, practical experience and operational excellence, Global Maritime will help you through every stage of your renewable energy project lifecycle, no matter where you sit in the value Globalchain.Maritimes experience in offshore wind, marine tidal and solar power combined with our innovative design, engineering and marine warranty knowledge, you can be sure of safe and effective design, execution and operations and a crucial future contribution to the energy mix.
• User friendly, fast, portable online system giving up to date and accurate information safely and efficiently.
The new standard www.globalmaritime.com MARINE & TIDAL SPONSORED BY 32 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
Industrial App Store manages access to client data and only allows apps to request the data for which they have been given the necessary permissions to obtain. The data request from an authorised app is routed to the client’s data historian by the Industrial App Store and passes the data back to the app.
• Users can access real-time data from a mobile, laptop or tablet, vessel, offshore platform or whilst on the move.
The Industrial App Store from Intelligent Plant makes getting value from your industrial data fast and easy by securing your data on-site and putting the applications in the cloud. Remove the classic hurdles associated with data lakes and get fast, easy access to analytics from anywhere.
How does it work?
Formed in 2006, Intelligent Plant Limited is an award winning UK based ISO 9001 registered software engineering company, focused on providing innovative services and value adding solutions to a broad range of industries and research facilities.
LaunchDevelopmentTechnologystage:Commercialdate:2016www.intelligentplant.com
In the business world, there is a need for a similar platform to allow the efficient and safe distribution of industrial apps. This is where Intelligent Plant’s Industrial App Store® leads the way. The Industrial App Store is an online shop window and secure data access portal that allows anyone to provide a service that requires secure access to their client’s process data. This data stays on the clients network so there is no need to copy, upload, or duplicate data in the cloud, which means no additional storage costs or transport fees.
• Simultaneously manages a workforce and enhances operations.
Intelligent Plant
MARINE & TIDAL
THE INDUSTRIAL APP STORE® FROM INTELLIGENT PLANT allows the efficient, secure distribution and analysis of data.
Most people are familiar with the term “apps”, which is an abbreviation of “applications” that are computer programs with a very specific and focused function. There are now hundreds of apps available on the Apple App Store that people download onto their iPhones and iPads providing both games and useful tools to book flights, identify music tracks from their audible signature or monitor your heart rate during exercise. These are great for personal use and tend to be easy to obtain at little or no cost.
Functions and Benefits • Customised, jargon-free approach to suit specific IT business requirements.
The beauty of this arrangement is that Industrial App Store clients don’t have to manage multiple connections and data requests in different formats and protocols to their servers on an ongoing basis. This reduces their cybersecurity risk to a single app store connection, which is established and tested once, is more easily monitored and, once set up, needs very little maintenance or support.
• Intuitive, progressive technology that cuts the need for spreadsheets and transforms business processes.
The company’s growing technical team consists of experienced engineers and computer scientists who together provide innovative and tailored solutions to their global client base. We are best known for providing the world’s first and only truly open and secure IIoT (Industrial Internet of Things) portal known as the Industrial App Store®. The Industrial App Store ® enables the secure remote performance monitoring of equipment and processes through the analysis and visualisation of real-time data, and in the management and interpretation of process alarm data.
• Records vital day-to-day operations data ensuring highest safety standards are met.
The clients maintain intellectual and physical ownership of their data and there is no write back to their own data historian, only to a separate app results historian that Intelligent Plant provides for free.
The configuration and deployment of the data acquisition system has been supported by the Interreg NWE OceanDEMO project.
User-friendly dashboards enable quick, secure and easy access to relevant data streams from anywhere in the world. This will enable Orbital’s Engineers to access data from the O2 turbine in real time without a requirement for manual intervention.
Invinity Energy Systems, a global leader and innovator of utility-grade energy storage, uses the flexibility of Intelligent Plants Industrial App Store to monitor the performance of their installed batteries across the globe.
The Industrial App Store also provides data to EMEC’s performance test engineers, streamlining the analysis of the tidal turbine’s performance as part of EMEC’s accredited testing services.
O2 Tidal Turbine
Invinity Energy Systems
Invinity Energy Systems
O2 Tidal Turbine sending not only Power, but Data onshore
The Industrial App Store has been securely integrated with the systems onboard the Orbital O2 tidal turbine which was deployed at EMEC’s “Fall of Warness” tidal test site, in June this year as part of the Horizon 2020 FloTEC project.
Intelligent Plant are proud to be working with Invinity on visualising and analysing their global fleet of batteries. We see that energy storage is key to maximising the effectiveness of renewable resources. Invinity have access to all appropriate apps in the Industrial App Store which are already providing insights and enabling decision making on assets distributed around the world. We look forward to continuing this fascinating journey.
Intelligent Plant recently won a project with the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) and Orbital Marine Power to assist in deploying a data acquisition system for the O2 tidal turbine. The system, which is linked to Intelligent Plant’s Industrial App Store, allows remote access to real time mission critical data and provides a cloudbased platform for EMEC to carry out power performance assessments for wave and tidal energy developers.
Invinity’s modular vanadium flow batteries store energy in an aqueous solution that never degrades, even under continuous maximum power and depth of discharge cycling. This patented technology is non-flammable and requires minimal maintenance and upkeep throughout its 20+ year service life.
The Company’s batteries have been deployed at more than 40 sites in 15 countries on 5 continents to date.
MARINE & SPONSOREDTIDALBY 33
This will improve the accessibility, storage and security of data for Orbital Marine Power’s operators, technicians and other stakeholders, providing cutting-edge data management tools to monitor the performance and status of the asset while in operation.
Ideal for use alongside renewable generation, Invinity’s flow batteries meet the energy needs of business, industry and electrical networks safely, reliably and economically.
MARINE & TIDAL
ELECTRIFICATION
Verlume’s Halo offshore wind solution was recently recognised as a winner in RWE’s first international Innovation Competition. In the system integration category, our offshore wind charging concept was acknowledged as innovative in overcoming the challenges of volatile offshore renewable energy generation. We are now in close exchange with RWE’s innovation team, an example of our ambitions to work with the global leaders in offshore wind.
Paul Slorach
Halo is a seabed battery energy storage system which has been specifically designed by Verlume for the harsh underwater environment, reducing operational emissions and facilitating the use of renewable energy by providing an uninterrupted power supply. Halo’s fundamental basis is its Intelligent Energy Management System, a fully integrated system which autonomously maximises available battery capacity in real time.
Supply Chain Innovators
Decarbonisation through intelligent energy management verlume.world
SPONSOREDELECTRIFICATIONBY
If you would like to engage with Verlume on a project proposal for INTOG, please contact paul.slorach@verlume.world BY PAUL SLORACH, BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR, VERLUME
he
T
multiple participation options within INTOG to align our expertise in intelligent energy management and energy storage to developers’ proposals. We are actively working to optimise our Halo technology for MW/MWh opportunities in the offshore wind sector and this opportunity is an extension of those activities.
Showcasing Scotland as a destination for world-leading emissions reduction projects, there will be an opportunity for supply chain innovators who can support operators to overcome challenges and successfully delivery these Verlume’sprojects.core technologies of intelligent energy management and storage for harsh environments have been created to reduce the carbon intensity of operations in the energy sector, with a focus on efficiency and sustainability. Working together with operators and developers, Verlume can provide the missing piece of the puzzle with intelligent energy management to mitigate the impacts of intermittency of supply from the offshore wind farms to allow for a reliable power supply.
Seabed Battery Energy Storage
Verlume has been innovating in Scotland and exporting this expertise for many years, sharing subsea experience and environmental good practice on a global scale. With an increasing global customer base, Verlume recently delivered the first commercial Halo battery energy storage system for a world-first offshore mini-grid demonstration at the US Navy Wave Energy Test Site in Hawaii.
As a leader in the energy transition for almost a decade, at Verlume, we are excited by the prospect of INTOG and the opportunity it presents. We firmly believe that offshore energy storage, particularly seabed energy storage, can add significant value to the leasing round offerings, helping to optimise power production profiles for offshore wind farms and for provision of Power-to-X functionality, such as underwater drones, electric surface vessels and green Weelectrolysers.arenowexploring
Bringing the value of seabed and offshore energy storage to INTOG
Crown Estate Scotland Innovation and Targeted Oil and Gas (INTOG) leasing round will be transformational for the Scottish oil and gas market. As the first initiative of its kind, it is set to significantly accelerate decarbonisation in the oil and gas sector through the integration of offshore wind farms to provide low carbon electricity for production installations.
Innovative low carbon technologies within INTOG will play a crucial role in reaching North Sea Transition Deal targets of reducing operational emissions by 50% by 2030. The INTOG leasing round recognises the contribution of oil and gas market decarbonisation in meeting Scotland’s and the UK’s wider net zero targets, through the use of the excellent offshore wind resources around existing oil and gas infrastructure.
With a track record of firsts, we are a leader in world-class intelligent energy management and storage technologies for decarbonisation of the energy sector. We offer a suite of products and services that are agnostic from a power generation and power demand perspective, with applications across the underwater, offshore and onshore sectors.
34 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
How Battery Energy Storage Supports the Growth of Electrification
The 1.8 MWh Invinity battery, which has an energy capacity equivalent to the daily consumption of over 200 UK households, will charge and discharge multiple times on a daily basis to ‘smooth’ the flow of power to the electrolyser. The ability of vanadium flow batteries to cycle multiple times without degradation means they are ideally suited for heavy-duty, stationary energy storage applications such as this.
Invinity VS3s at Scottish Water Perth
T
On the supply side, low-carbon, but intermittent renewable generation, such as wind, solar and tidal, is being deployed at ever greater scale. Whilst undeniably representative of significant progress towards achieving net zero, combined, these demand and supply dynamics are increasing the pressure on national electricity networks. In the UK for example, vast amounts of renewable generation are curtailed each day, and waiting lists for new grid connections are measured in years rather than months.
35
he “Electrification of Everything” has become a fundamental pillar of the global low-carbon energy transition. The meteoric growth of electric vehicles (EVs) in the past years, coupled with increasingly widespread initiatives to decarbonise heat and the expanding green hydrogen industry are all contributing to vastly increased global electricity demand.
Companies are also installing their own renewable generation as part of their drive towards net zero. Earlier this year, Scottish Water completed work on its first largescale solar + battery storage project which sees an Invinity flow battery combined with solar generation, enabling around 94% of the renewable power generated to be used on site – a significant step forward in the company’s decarbonisation ambitions. Furthermore, the carbon footprint of the treatment works will be cut by around 160 tonnes of CO2 per annum – the equivalent of offsetting 580,000 miles from the average passenger car. The scheme will also help to power the utility’s first rapid electric vehicle charging points which have been installed at the site; and will reduce energy costs of the treatment works by approximately 40%.
High-thoughput, long-duration vanadium flow batteries are a new asset class of energy storage which is already playing a critical role in the next phase of the global energy transition. Batteries are now being asked to serve these grids near-constantly, in order to avoid firing up uneconomical and environmentally inefficient legacy coal and gas generation assets. As the proportion of renewable generation increases, the energy throughput demands of batteries grow too, ensuring that high-throughput energy storage technologies, capable of cycling multiple times per day without degrading, are rapidly becoming an intrinsic part of our energy system. Vanadium flow batteries enable more “on-demand” access to low-cost, low-carbon renewable energy by managing intermittency and transmission constraints, accelerating progress towards net zero, improving national energy security and also helping to keep electricity bills low for the end consumer.
Graeme Harrison HIE Neil Kermode EMEC and Michael Matheson MSP (Credit: Colin Keldie, EMEC)
Addressing the growth of urban decarbonisation and to support expanding electricity demand, in July this year, the world’s largest hybrid battery was officially launched. Located at the heart of the Energy Superhub Oxford, developed by Pivot Power, part of EDF Renewables, this innovative hybrid battery consists of a 2 MW / 5 MWh vanadium flow battery from Invinity alongside a 50 MW / 50 MWh lithium-ion battery which creates a resilient system that can perform a range of services for the UK grid, and has the capacity to power over 6,000 homes. Since Invinity’s vanadium flow batteries combine fast response with zero degradation and the ability to cycle indefinitely, its role as part of this battery is to act as the first line of response, performing much of the ‘heavy lifting’ required and reduce wear on the lithium-ion portion of the system. This system provides the flexibility needed to incorporate what is believed to be Europe’s most powerful EV charging hub into the project at the nearby Redbridge Park and Ride site. The project will also support the UK’s target of 50 GW of offshore wind and 70 GW of solar by the 2030s, which should enable an almost fully decarbonised grid by 2035. Projects like this also help the Government to reduce the country’s dependence on gas, boosting national energy security whilst simultaneously offering a low-carbon way of delivering the UK’s energy needs.
ELECTRIFICATIONSPONSOREDBYELECTRIFICATION
The UK’s growing hydrogen industry is another important pillar of the wider energy transition, especially in regard to the decarbonisation of industrial processes. The production of green hydrogen via electrolysis requires a consistent supply of renewable electricity. In another first of its kind, a vanadium flow battery has been integrated with tidal generation at the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) in the Orkney Isles to provide consistent and stable green electricity to power an electrolyser. While tides can be predicted (there are two high and two low tides every day), electricity generated from tidal power is still variable because of ‘slack water’.
The need to balance low-carbon supply and demand using largely existing network infrastructure is a key barrier on the road to net zero and battery energy storage systems have a very important role to play as the missing piece in the net zero jigsaw.
The acquisition of this portfolio marks Albioma's entry into solar power in Brazil, a business with strong growth potential and which complements its existing assets.
The 96-acre site between Wellesbourne and Newbold Pacey will, according to applicants Novus Renewable Services, power around 5,500 homes when up and running and would almost double the biodiversity due to rewilding and planting across the land.
Operating its historical biomass business model in Brazil since 2014, Albioma is thus continuing to develop here, in line with its international diversification strategy. She added: “I am in support of renewable energy projects of the right size, in the right location and which avoid destroying the rural character of the landscape providing essential food production. I have significant concerns about this application.
But the plans were opposed by parish and district councillors who told the latest [Aug 17] Stratford District Council planning committee that the site was in the wrong place.
French renewable energy producer has acquired six sites with an installed capacity of 31.6MWp French renewable energy producer Albioma has entered the Brazilian solar market with the acquisition of a portfolio of six PV power
Those sentiments were echoed by Cllr Anne Parry (Con, Wellesbourne East) who said the site was at the entrance to an ancient mediaeval village.
Two members of the public also spoke against the plans but the committee also heard that there was plenty of support with 48 letters sent to the council.
One of those backing the scheme was Stephen Norrie, chair of Stratford Climate Action, who said: “I don't think it is responsible to block solar projects that are actually on the table because we are waiting for the government to maybe make it easier to install solar panels on roofs or for perfect sites to come forward that noone will object to.
A solar farm stretching across five fields has been approved by councillors in spite of calls for the land to be retained for agriculture.
“Talk of the industrialisation of the countryside invokes images of dark satanic mills pumping out poisonous smog while what we are facing are quiet, clean solar panels surrounded by wildflower meadows nibbled by a few sheep and largely screened from view.”
Members of the planning committee were split. Cllr Bill Fleming (Con, Bidford West and Salford) said: “Saying that this is poor grade land is a fallacy - you can see the quality of the crops grown.
Cllr Roger Wright, from Newbold Pacey and Ashorne Parish Council, said: “The main issues are on landscape and the sheer scale of the development. Approval would completely destroy the ancient character of Newbold Pacey and the historical landscape character.”
But Cllr Matt Jennings (Con, Henley) said: “There are emotional reasons to object to this but we are not here to make judgements on emotions, we are here to make decisions on sound material reasons. There is no loss of agricultural land, the biodiversity benefits are there and it is a temporary measure.”
“It’s a balance between losing that land for electricity or looking after the heritage that we have in a really good agricultural area which I don’t think should be buried under solar panels.”
Operating under a distributed generation system with high-quality counterparties, the power plants are located in four states and are fully operational. The Brazilian local competition authority (CADE) has approved the transaction without restrictions, Albioma said. The contract is subject to other price adjustments and other clauses typical of this type of transaction, it added.
RCP are a leading supplier of solar power and battery back up systems typically used for “off-grid” applications, offering a safe and reliable energy source, available to power your critical equipment in remote and hazardous environments.
“If granted it would result in the obliteration of this countryside. Even the developers acknowledge that the impact on the landscape is moderate to high. In my view it is exceptionally high.”
Albioma enters Brazilian solar market
Control Systems
Large solar farm approved in south Warwickshire - despite calls for the land to be retained for agriculture Developers hope the 96-acre site between Wellesbourne and Newbold Pacey will power around 5,500 homes.
SOLAR
Underplants.the terms of the contract signed with solar developer GreenYellow, Albioma becomes the sole shareholder of the companies owning these projects, which a total installed capacity of 31.6MWp.
for the Next Generation rcpat.com SPONSOREDsolar BY 36 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
“This project is a significant step in reaching our aims of carbon net zero by 2030. Due to changes in the treatment process at our sites over recent years, many have been left with surplus operational land which can be used for the generation of renewable energy,” said Daniel Oxley, commercial programme manager at Yorkshire Water. “These have been identified and will become home to new solar panel arrays. Once completed, the first deployment of solar panels will generate 4% of our annual power needs, increasing our renewable energy use, reducing our exposure to energy price volatility and reducing the operational costs of our sites, which will provide better value for money for our customers.”
Yorkshire Water enlists asset manager Downing to develop £25 million solar portfolio Yorkshire Water is set to decarbonise its operations via a £25 million portfolio made up of 28 solar sites.
SPONSOREDSOLARBY
Downing’s latest project with Yorkshire Water aims to continue the company’s strong solar portfolio whilst showcasing the benefits of responsible investment as the world races towards net zero targets.
Once completed, the project will directly contribute to Yorkshire Water’s 2030 net zero pledge aiming to deploy up to 120MW of solar by 2030 alongside a minimum of 30% of all electricity use coming from onsite renewables.
“When operational, it will reduce annual emissions by 239 tonnes at this busy site. We’re committed to take positive action to tackle climate change, and this cut in emissions will boost our ambitions to reduce carbon emissions across the city to net-zero by 2030.”
The installation of solar PV and BESS is expected to contribute to the wider goal of being a net zero port by 2030 with 98% of the electricity consumed by the port to come from solar and battery combined during peak Greenconditions.energy produced from the solar PV will allow the port to offer shore power for smaller ships, without having to take extra power from the local electricity grid.
Downing Renewables & Infrastructure Trust outlined in its 2020 Prospectus plans to raise £200 million to develop a portfolio of renewables including solar PV. This emphasis on solar generation led to Downing securing multiple deals to develop sites across the UK. In March 2021, the firm stated it had acquired a 96MWp portfolio of UK solar PV assets for £42 million.
Assisting a national utility company with its goal of reaching net zero by 2030 is a superb example of Downing’s commitment to responsible investing,” said Sean Moore, investment director at Downing. “We are delighted to support energyintensive industries such as water companies in making progressive strides to reduce their carbon footprint.”
“We’re delighted to be partnering with Yorkshire Water for this solar project.
The portfolio is made up of 13 groundmount sites across mainland Britain with a total capacity of c.73MWp, 28 commercial rooftops with a capacity of c.10MWp and seven residential rooftop portfolios across Northern Ireland with a total capacity of c.13MWp.
37
The company’s strong asset performance drove its profit on investments 16.9% above expectations earlier this year, with portfolio generation 4.7% above expectations at 195GWh. As such the firm is expected to take a greater market share in the coming years as it builds its renewable portfolio.
The scheme has been managed by Portsmouth City Council’s in-house energy services team and installed by Custom Solar.of our sites, which will provide better value for money for our customers.”
To achieve this, the utility company has enlisted the support of investment and asset manager Downing LLP to develop, design and build a solar portfolio with a generation capacity of around 21MW.
Storage tomajorInternationalPortsmouthPortachievesmilestoneonthepathnetzero
The project, which began in February 2022, is aiming to install rooftop solar PV across several buildings, alongside battery storage and solar canopies. Currently, the project has installed 2660 solar panels and is ready for the next development stage. This will see a megawatt sized battery energy storage system (BESS) installed as part of the renewable installation. The 1.5MWh BESS will capture green power and distribute it across the port instead of being exported from the site.
SOLAR
“It is the council’s priority to support clean growth. This major milestone on this innovative project means that the project is on-track to begin generating clean energy later this year,” said Councillor Kimberly Barrett, cabinet member for climate change and environment at Portsmouth City Council.
Portsmouth International Port has become the ‘first’ in the UK to have solar canopies installed as part of a wider project to be net zero by 2030.
The Dutch Council of Ministers announced in June new areas for offshore wind farms to be built off the coast of the Netherlands by 2030.
PGE, Ørsted Add Ramboll, Projmors to Baltica Team Dutch issue survey tender for new offshore sites
The solar project, an investment worth around £25m (€29.4m), will generate a total capacity of approximately 21MW, Downing said.
The construction of the solar farms will contribute directly to Yorkshire Water’s 2030 net zero pledge, as all electricity generated will be consumed on site by the utility.
contracts
The tender for these wind farms will be opened from 2025.
Assisting a national utility company with its goal of reaching net zero by 2030 is a superb example of Downing’s commitment to responsible investing.
Contract to carry out geophysical investigations at Nederwiek Wind Farm Sites Zuid & Noord and another location.
Algeria is Africa's biggest gas exporter and supplies around 11 percent of the natural gas consumed in Europe.
www.infinity-partnership.com
“We start cooperation with a contractor who has extensive experience in the field of offshore wind energy and the process of obtaining permit”, said Wojciech Dąbrowski, President of the Management Board of PGE Polska Grupa Energetyczna.
The deadline for the task is the third quarter of The2023.Baltica 3 wind farm will have an installed capacity of 1,045 MW. The wind farm is scheduled to be commissioned in 2026, and the closing of financing for this investment is planned for 2023.
Downing partnered with net zero consultancy, Ikigai, who acted as a strategic adviser and behind the meter codevelopment partner to Downing throughout the tender process, that began in 2020.
“We are pleased that the consortium includes a design office from Gdańsk, which is proof that Polish companies are actively using the opportunities to join the development of offshore wind energy in Poland”.
Infinity Partnership is an award-winning, multi-disciplinary accountancy and business advisory practice, with a proactive approach to customer service.
Downing wins contract for 28 UK solar sites by 2030 to the country's offshore wind capacity.Algeria, historically its second biggest supplier, to reduce that dependence after Russia's invasion of Ukraine sparked sanctions against Moscow and sent energy prices soaring.
The consortium’s task is to prepare design documentation for offshore foundations, wind turbines, inter-array cables, and substations, as well as to obtain a building permit, and then prepare the technical design of the Baltica offshore wind farm.
The contract will start on 5 December 2022 until 30 June 2024, with no option to renew. Interested parties have until 1pm on 10 October to apply.
The Polish subsidiary of engineering consultancy Ramboll, together with the Polish maritime construction design office Projmors, will prepare a construction project for both stages of the Baltica offshore wind farm, namely Baltica 2 and Baltica 3, implemented jointly by Ørsted and PGE Group.
The 1,498 MW Baltica 2 wind farm is slated for commissioning in 2027, and the closing of financing for this investment is planned for 2024.
The 10.7GW capacity will be split three new areas – Nederwiek and Doordewind – and two previously designated areas are the northern part of IJmuiden Ver and the southern part of Hollandse Kust West.
The Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO) has issued a tender carry out geophysical investigations for potential offshore wind sites along its North Sea coastline.
Yorkshire Water provides water and sewerage services to over five million people and 100,000 businesses in the Yorkshire region.
Infinity has been a five-time winner at the British Accountancy Awards and has been a three-time finalist at the Scottish Accountancy Awards in recent times.
Infinity Partnership: Your Partner in Business
Together with the previously planned 11GW, the new sites will add about 21GW Ørsted and PGE Group have selected a consortium of Ramboll Polska and Projmors to prepare the construction of the 2.5 GW Baltica offshore wind farm in Poland.
contract awards SPONSORED BY 38 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
Investment director at Downing Sean Moore said: "We’re delighted to be partnering with Yorkshire Water for this solar project.
The 3D-UHRS Survey Campaign will cover offshore Nederwiek Wind Farm Sites Zuid & Noord (North and South) and one other possible investigation area.
Investment and asset manager Downing LLP has been selected by utility Yorkshire Water to develop, design, build and operate a portfolio of 28 solar sites across Yorkshire.
Felipe Montero, Project Director of Hai Long, said “As preferred suppliers for our offshore substations Semco Maritime and PTSC M&C have proven that they are the best possible partners for delivering a hugely important part of our Hai Long projects, and we are pleased to have signed the EPC contract with them, which will allow us to continue to making progress and reaching new milestones.”
contractsSPONSOREDBY
39
The firm’s energy transition credentials have grown significantly in the past few years. As well as expanding its offshore wind clients’ portfolio, it was recently granted ORE Catapult’s Fit 4 Offshore Renewables status for its EPC services. The programme was developed to help the UK supply chain to reconfigure and deliver services in the offshore renewable energy sector. In the last 12 months, the business has also acquired low carbon engineering specialists Synergie Environ and front-end consultancy Optimus.
Mark Davidson, project director and energy transition leader at PD&MS, added: “Winning this three-year minimum contract with Vattenfall following a competitive tender process is testament to our team’s connected competencies which match the disciplines needed by offshore wind. We have an extensive track record for delivering innovative and costeffective project solutions which have proven to reduce cost and maximise asset uptime to create significant ongoing value within the offshore renewable energy sector. Underpinned by our flexible proactive culture we are well placed to further service the UK and European decarbonisation agenda.”
This award underpins PD&MS’ ever-growing position as a key supplier in O&M and inspection in the offshore wind sector, and builds on the success of the safe and efficient delivery of several onshore and offshore wind projects for its clients including SSE Renewables and Moray East Offshore Windfarm.
Hai Long is being jointly developed by Northland Power, Yushan Energy and Mitsui & Co and consists of the Hai Long 2 and Hai Long 3 offshore wind farms in the Taiwan Strait around 50 km from shore. After being awarded the preferred supplier agreement in late 2021, the consortium led by Semco Maritime with PTSC M&C, supported by primary sub-contractor ISC Consulting Engineers, has initiated the execution of the project by entering the EPC contract with Hai Long Offshore Wind Project.
Aberdeen-headquartered PD&MS Group has secured a three-year operations and maintenance (O&M) contract with Vattenfall to support its European offshore wind portfolio for an undisclosed sum.
“Our initial cooperation with the parties involved in the Hai Long Offshore Wind Project has been a true pleasure, and we are thrilled that the contract has been signed enabling us to take the next steps on this journey with our consortium partner PTSC M&C and subcontractors,” said Vice President Renewables, Semco Maritime, Frank Holm.
The contract, which also has options to extend for a further two-year period, will see the leading international engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning (EPCC) specialist providing a wide range of key support across the developer’s windfarms in the United Kingdom, The Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark.
Now in its 20th year, PD&MS is a multidiscipline EPCC contractor and has been delivering mid-value capital projects, O&M, general modifications, upgrade projects, late life asset management and decommissioning services across the energy sector. It currently employs around 550 in Scotland and 100 overseas, with operations in Aberdeen, Glasgow Azerbaijan.
Hai Long will contribute to the realisation of the Taiwanese government’s ambition of reaching 5.5GW of installed offshore wind capacity and securing a “leading position” for Taiwan in offshore wind in east Asia.
The engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract follows on from the consortium’s selection as a “preferred supplier” in October 2021.
Dave Bruce, Chief Executive Officer at Sword, commented: “We are delighted to continue and extend our strong working relationship with Ithaca Energy. Sword Group has much to offer with the combination of our extensive Energy Sector experience, strong service management ethos and the wider capabilities of our organisation - we look forward to working alongside Ithaca Energy for the years to come.”
Sword celebrates 3-year IT and IM contract award with leading North Sea operator
PD&MS awarded three-year contract to support Vattenfall’s European operations
By elevating their IT and IM services to a scalable provider, Ithaca Energy can access relevant specialist expertise and resources on demand to fit their evolving business priorities over the next 3 years and beyond. Stable technology foundations also enables Ithaca Energy to focus on delivering enhancements to their UKCS operations.
Following the EPC contract signing, the consortium will proceed with the detailed design, procurement, construction and commissioning of the two offshore substations including jackets. These will be fabricated at PTSC M&C’s yard in Vungtau City, in southern Vietnam. The project is planned for offshore installation in 2024 and completion of commissioning in 2026.
Ian MacKenzie, Technology and Innovation Manager at Ithaca Energy, added: “We have an excellent working relationship with Sword and are pleased to have made this contract award. We look forward to collaborating with them to deliver enhanced outcomes to our business and realising the benefits of their breadth and depth of experience.”
Semco, PTSC to supply Hai Long offshore substations
contracts
Thomas Barter head of renewables business development at PD&MS said: “We are thrilled that Vattenfall has recognised our highly transferable skills gained from years of successfully operating across oil and gas and other energy sectors and chosen us as one Sword is delighted to have signed a three-year agreement with Ithaca Energy UK Ltd for the provision of Information Technology (IT) and Information Management (IM) services.
A consortium led by Semco Maritime and PTSC M&C has won a contract to supply two offshore substations for the 1044MW Hai Long offshore wind project off Taiwan. of their long-term service providers. This new contract solidifies PD&MS’ position as a key supplier for future wind developments, such as ScotWind and other future European projects.”
The three-year contract utilises Sword’s full managed service offerings to deliver a proactive service improvement program for Ithaca Energy. This builds on a working relationship that began in 2019 between Sword and Ithaca Energy, spanning information systems, data, and digitising working processes.
PD&MS was founded in 2002 and is owned by private equity firm Inflexion, which completed a secondary buyout in 2014
40 SIGN UP HERE MANAGING THE TRANSITION TO A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE pim-ltd.com
GLOBAL www.ogv.energy/eventsEVENTSVIEW ALL EVENTS AT 3RD HYDROGENINTERNATIONALAVIATION CONFERENCE (IHAC 2022) 1 SEP - GLASGOW, UK GASTECH EXHIBITION & CONFERENCE 5-8 SEP - MILAN, ITALY SETS 2022 5-7 SEPNETHERLANDSEINDHOVEN WORLD ASSOCIATIONNUCLEARSYMPOSIUM 7-9 SEP - LONDON, UK THE POWER & ELECTRICITY SHOW PHILIPPINES 7-8 SEP - MANILA, PHILIPPINES THE BATTERY SHOW NORTH AMERICA 13-15 SEP - NOVI, USA PAPUA NEW GUINEA ENERGY SUMMIT 13-15 SEP - PORT MORESBY, PAPUA NEW GUINEA OIL & GAS ASIA 13-15 SEP - KUALA LUMPUR MALAYSIA ELENEX INDONESIA 14-16 SEPINDONESIAJAKARTA, CHINA WIND POWER 6-8 SEP - BEIJIN, CHINA ELECTRA MINING AFRICA 5-6 SEP - SOUTH AFRICA ONLINE 33RD CONGRESS OF THE INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF THE SCIENCESAERONAUTICAL 4-9 SEP - STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN EVENTSExperts in managementtravel Delivering unique and valuable travel management solutions for companies operating in the Energy sector. www.travelctm.co.uk GET IN TOUCH 41
STATS & SPONSOREDANALYTICSBY stats & Analytics
Jointly developed by China Three Gorges Corporation and Ming Yang Smart Energy, the floating wind demonstration, which is located off the coast of Guangdong in Mainland China, comprises a MySE 5.5-158 wind turbine as well as a semi-submersible foundation designed by China Three Gorges Corporation and constructed by Wison Offshore & Marine. The turbine was installed in mid-July 2021 and the infield cables were installed in end-August 2021.
About a year ago in the second quarter of 2021, Mainland China became the world’s largest offshore wind market. Mainland China now has 25GW of operational capacity. With this rapid expansion in fixed-bottom offshore wind development, it’ no wonder that Mainland China is also fast-tracking its development in floating Accordingwind.toWestwood’s WindLogix data, Mainland China is currently ranked fifth globally in terms of installed floating wind capacity to date with 5.5MW. By 2026, Mainland China is estimated to have commissioned a total floating wind capacity of 477MW, 13.4% of the global floating wind capacity, which is forecasted to be 3.6GW by 2026.
Mainland China Floating Wind Focus
Top five countries with estimated commissioned floating wind capacity by 2026 Source: Westwood WindLogix Westwood estimates that eight floating wind projects, mostly demonstrations, are likely to be operational in the period between 2021 and 2026. These include the 7.25MW CNOOC Deep Sea Floating, 6.2MW CSSC Fu Yao Floating Demo, 5.5MW CTG Yangxi Shapa Deepwater Floating Demo/Three Gorges Leader, 200MW Hainan PFS-1 Wanning Southeast, 4MW Longyuan Putian Nanri Island Floating Pilot, 15MW Nezzy 2 Demonstrator, 25MW Shanghai Deep & Far Sea Demonstration (Floating) and the 10MW Wenzhou Goldwind Floating Demo. Key projects and EPC/EPCI contractors
Westwood Global Energy Group are specialist providers of detailed market intelligence for the offshore energy sector, covering; offshore rigs, production facilities, subsea equipment, subsea services, offshore marine and offshore renewables and power.
The 7.25MW CNOOC Deep Sea Floating is currently under construction at the Offshore Oil Engineering yard in Qingdao and estimated to be operational in 2022/2023. When installed offshore, the 7.25MW project will be located in a water depth of 120m in the northern waters of the South China Sea off Guangdong province. Ming Yang Smart Energy is supplying the turbine and CNOOC Rongfeng Energy Co. is the project developer.
Key takeaways
Floating wind developers in Mainland China consist of a variety of companies, including traditional offshore wind developers such as China Three Gorges Corporation and Longyuan Power, however in the mix are oil and gas operator China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) and supply chain giant China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC).
The Guangdong province has the most proposed floating wind projects, four out of the eight targeted to be operational within the next five years, are from this province. Of special note, the Hainan province is moving into offshore wind development which includes floating wind. The Hainan Wanning Southeast 1GW project, which is being developed in two phases, is highlighted as part of the province’s 14th Five Year Plan projects.
Author: Ruth Chen, Senior Analyst, Westwood Global Energy Group
The CTG Yangxi Shapa Deepwater Floating Demo, also known as the Three Gorges Leader, with a capacity of 5.5MW, is the first project to be operational as of early December 2021.
Next steps
STATS & ANALYTICS SPONSORED BY 42 www.ogv.energy - Issue 1
Ming Yang Smart Energy has taken the lead in supplying the turbines for floating wind projects so far, being involved in two out of three projects near commissioning. Other turbine manufacturers involved include CSSC Haizhuang and Goldwind.
Westwood Global Energy Group www.westwoodenergy.com in 2022. The project is owned by the turbine OEM CSSC Haizhuang, a subsidiary of China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC). The engineering, procurement, construction and installation (EPCI) of the 6.2MW CSSC Fu Yao Floating Demo was completed in early June 2022 by Poly Changda Engineering.
Top Five Countries with estimated commissioned floating wind capacity by 2026
Mainland China’s second floating wind project, the 6.2MW CSSC Fu Yao Floating Demo, is expected to be commissioned
With regards to the dynamic cables, companies involved in supplying these to the floating wind projects include Orient Cable and Hengtong Cable.
A key project in the 2022 plans of the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China, is to research 10MW floating wind turbines. Mainland China is making strides in floating wind, which includes increasing the number of demonstrations, commercializing floating wind projects and increasing the turbine rating for floating wind projects. Will Mainland China dominate in floating wind like it has for fixedbottom wind? That is indeed a possibility.
+44 (0) 1779 479 742 www.jbsgroupglobal.com Dales Industrial Estate Peterhead, Scotland, AB42 3GZ info@jbsgroupglobal.com Sea Axe (pictured) is an advanced mass flow excavation system, which works through natural erosion of the seabed hence it is the most environmentally acceptable method available for subsea excavation. Natural erosion significantly reduces the impact on the ecological environment. JBS are a leading global provider of engineering solutions specialising in Fabrication & Engineering Services, Blast Containment and Subsea futureTransformingExcavationtheofoffshorewindprojects
ApplicationsCable/Pipeline/Umbilical Trenching Cable/Pipeline/Umbilical Deburial Freespan RoBackfillingRectification&BurialckDump&DrillCutting Removal Uxo & Salvage Deburial Harbour Clearance Jack up Spud Can Clearing & Cleaning Subsea Structure Deburial & Access Boulder Grab Removal Sandwave/Route Corridor Clearance
