Offshore Wind Journal 4th Quarter 2018

4th Quarter 2018 www.owjonline.com

Journal

Industry innovators fast-track new O&M concepts

Drones, AI and IoT make on-demand monitoring a reality Low-noise pile driver can outperform noise mitigation systems “The UK needs to get hold of the floating offshore wind market and own it or risk losing out to other countries�

Emma Pinchbeck, executive director, RenewableUK, see page 26

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Contents 4th Quarter 2018 volume 7 issue 4

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15

Regulars 5 COMMENT

Area reports

6 US: America has a pipeline of 25 GW of offshore wind projects that is growing all the time 10 Japan: analysts suggest that offshore wind could be at a tipping point in the country, led by floating windfarm projects

New markets

12 Vietnam is a potentially significant market for the offshore wind industry but policy and regulatory changes are required

26

Condition monitoring

15 Service companies and technology providers are planning to use drones, artificial intelligence, advanced sensors, wireless networks, and the internet of things to automate fault detection

Turbine technology

18 Industry leaders say there are few technical barriers to 20 MW offshore turbines

Finance

20 Shared projects, shared tenders and joint R&D projects could help to reduce the cost of offshore wind but Brexit isn’t likely to help the process

Foundations

28

23 The US stands ready to take advantage of the development of new, large turbines but when it comes to foundations the picture is more complex

Floating offshore wind

26 Floating offshore wind has huge potential, but where will the first commercial-scale projects be built, by whom, and is there sufficient political support in Europe for the sector?

Noise control

28 Fistuca says the water-driven pile-driver it has developed makes piling quieter than work undertaken with hydraulic hammers and noise mitigation systems

Operations & maintenance

30 A leading manufacturer of offshore wind turbines is collaborating with experts in Denmark’s Fast Track project to develop solutions to leading edge erosion

30

Offshore access

33 A new generation of lifting systems is being developed that complement motion-compensated gangways

Project focus

36 UK content has long been an issue in offshore windfarms but at least half of the value of one of the largest projects now being implemented should fall to UK companies

Training & recruitment

38 A newly published study suggests that by 2032, the UK will need 36,000 people employed in the offshore wind sector, triple the number currently working in it. Where will they come from?

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Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

Contents 4th Quarter 2018 volume 7 issue 4

Service operation vessels

40 New vessels have been launched in Europe and SOV designs are being developed for the US market 43 Operation and maintenance units in the offshore wind industry tend to be categorised as crew transfer or service operation vessels, but there is a ‘third way’

NEXT ISSUE

• Area report: Scotland • Area report: China • Area report: US • Area report: Taiwan • Emerging markets for offshore wind • Operations and maintenance • Fixed/floating foundations • Turbine technology • Finance • Offshore access/walk-to-work • Noise control and environmental issues • Training & recruitment • Project focus • Turbine maintenance and repair • Condition monitoring • Crew transfer/SOV/installation cable-lay vessels Front cover: Engineers from Alpha Offshore Service undertake an inspection of the blades of an offshore wind turbine (photo: Alpha Offshore Service)

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COMMENT | 5

Wind/hydrogen hybrids have plenty of potential

W David Foxwell, Editor

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ind is leading the clean energy transition, said the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), Fatih Birol, at the Wind Energy Summit in Hamburg in September.

In the IEA’s projections, wind is on course to become Europe’s leading power source by 2030 and wind generation will triple by 2040.

But there’s a problem: electricity from wind energy needs to be integrated into Europe’s existing infrastructure, infrastructure that wasn’t designed to deal with growing wind energy generation, much of it offshore. As Dr Birol put it, “it’s not a peanuts issue.”

As director general for energy policy at Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, Thorsten Herdan told the summit, “without a grid connection, wind is useless.”

There’s the rub: wind is clean and ever-more cost-effective as a source of power, but without some blue-sky thinking, its growth could be constrained. He went on to remark that industry and governments need to think proactively about how grid infrastructure can be improved.

“We need a system-wide approach,” he told delegates, “and need to think about alternatives to the electricity grid, including the gas grid,” by which he meant the potential for green hydrogen produced from wind energy.

Dr Birol went on to say that ongoing cost reduction in wind energy and in particular in offshore wind, could “open the door” to new ways to use electricity from wind. “It could open the door to hydrogen,” he said. That concept – using electricity from wind energy to electrolyse hydrogen, which could be used throughout the energy sector – could have edged a little closer, when a number of grid operators committed themselves to the first large-scale project to use green power from wind to produce hydrogen which would be distributed in the gas grid.

OWJ has already reported on one project, in Belgium, that is leading the way in the production

of green hydrogen, where Eoly, part of Colruyt Group in Belgium, Fluxys and offshore wind developer Parkwind are collaborating on an industrial-scale power-to-gas project. October 2018 saw three grid operators come together to develop a power-to-gas facility using electricity from offshore wind to stabilise the grid, limit curtailment and reduce the future need for grid expansion.

The plan saw TenneT, Gasunie Deutschland and Thyssengas put forward a concept that would couple the electricity and gas grids in their respective countries. Together, they are planning to build a 100-MW power-to-gas pilot plant in Lower Saxony using offshore wind energy from the North Sea. The ‘Element One’ pilot project will give the companies initial experience with power-to-gas facilities on an industrial scale. Starting in 2022, the pilot plant will be connected to the grid gradually.

By converting green energy into gas, it will develop new storage capacities for renewable energy.

The partners ultimately hope to achieve a comprehensive coupling of the energy, transport and industrial sectors. Gas that has been produced from green energy will be transported from the North Sea to the Ruhr region through existing pipelines, but other potential applications are foreseen. The gas could also be made available to the transport sector through hydrogen filling stations and to industrial consumers through storage facilities.

Other projects that will use offshore wind to produce green hydrogen are also under development, but more about that later. Offshore and onshore wind have a huge role to play in the clean energy transition, Dr Birol said, but we are only at the beginning of the story. We need a more flexible system that meets the needs of the transition. If that can be developed, the next chapter of that transition will see hydrogen derived from wind – an energy source described by another speaker at the event as “universally usable” – penetrating further into the transport sector, and into industry. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

6 | AREA REPORT US

Trump administration turns bullish about offshore wind as pipeline exceeds 25 GW Wind energy projects are underway in 30 states in the US, with a growing number in coastal states on the east and west coast and a groundswell of political support for the technology Governors such as New York state’s Andrew Cuomo have been vocal in support of offshore wind energy

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

A

s briefly highlighted in the Q3 2018 issue of OWJ, the unexpectedly low wholesale price the state of Massachusetts will pay for electricity generated from the 800-MW Vineyard Wind offshore wind project – America’s first large, commercial-scale project – gave a huge boost to the US offshore wind energy sector in August.

Documents from the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, Department of Energy Resources released by the state show that Vineyard Wind will provide the Commonwealth with energy and renewable energy certificates at a total levelised price of US$0.065/kWhr over the term of the contracts. The department said that, on average, the contracts are expected to reduce customer’s monthly electricity bills (rather than add to them) by 0.1% to 1.5%.

The months since the Massachusetts announcement have been busy ones with President Donald Trump’s Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke swinging firmly behind offshore wind, which he described as “a source of abundant and affordable energy for the US.” Speaking at the American Wind Energy Association’s (AWEA’s) Offshore Wind Conference, Secretary Zinke announced details of a much-anticipated wind auction in federal waters off the coast of Massachusetts; environmental review of a proposed project offshore Rhode Island; and the next steps to a first-ever wind auction in federal waters off California.

“I’m very bullish on offshore wind, and harnessing this renewable resource is a big part of the Trump Administration's made in America energy strategy,” said Secretary Zinke. “We are always looking at new ways to increase American innovation and productivity to provide abundant and affordable energy for our homes and manufacturers. I think this is a win for America.

Working together with states, fishermen and the energy industry, we are making offshore wind a reality, and these three historic announcements are proof.”

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) will hold the next offshore wind auction – to include nearly 390,000 acres offshore Massachusetts – on 13 December 2018. Nineteen companies have qualified to participate in the auction for the Massachusetts Wind Energy Area, demonstrating continued strong commercial interest in the US offshore wind market.

“The Massachusetts sale has a lot of potential for both energy and economic activity,” Secretary Zinke said. “If fully developed, the wind auction could support approximately 4.1 GW of power.”

BOEM will publish a notice of intent to prepare an environmental impact statement for the construction and ions

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US AREA REPORT | 7

operations plan for the South Fork Wind Project offshore Rhode Island. If approved, the plan would allow construction and operation of up to 15 turbines that connect via a transmission cable to a grid in East Hampton, New York, the east end of Long Island. The project is approximately 19 miles southeast of Block Island. The notice was published in the Federal Register on 19 October and will have a 30-day public comment period closing on 19 November.

In what could result in the first west coast offshore wind auction, BOEM will also publish a call for information and nominations to identify companies interested in commercial wind energy leases within three proposed areas off central and northern California.

This is the first step towards offering a location for wind leasing.

The three call areas include 85 whole Outer Continental Shelf blocks and 573 partial blocks and together comprise approximately 2,779 km. The call was published in the Federal Register on 19 October and will have a 100-day public comment period closing on 27 January 2018.

As was evident at the AWEA event, the race for offshore wind leadership in the US is heating up and around the country a flurry of recent announcements from states and offshore developers are shaping the future of the industry. So many are the potential projects that according to the Department of Energy, as of June 2018, the US offshore wind project development pipeline exceeded 25 GW of planned capacity. Offshore wind projects are being proposed right around the country, on the east coast, in California and even Oregon, which have some of the strongest offshore wind resources in the country. Then there’s Hawaii, while back on the east coast, BOEM is already looking at additional sites in the New York Bight. Politics has played a role in which US states are committing to offshore wind, but realisation of the manufacturing, infrastructure and employment potential of offshore wind has convinced former sceptics.

Massachusetts’ commitment to offshore wind seems safe whatever political developments take place there, with incumbent Governor Charlie Baker and challenger Jay Gonzalez having pledged to continue with offshore wind energy.

In June 2018, Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy and the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection announced that Connecticut selected 200 MW of offshore wind as part of a recent Clean Energy request for proposals issued in January.

The offshore wind project will also be a part of Deepwater Wind’s Revolution Wind project, selected by Rhode Island in May. Construction on Revolution Wind could begin as soon as 2020, with the project in operation in 2023.

In New York state, Governor Andrew Cuomo has set a goal of generating 50% of the state’s electricity from renewable sources by 2030, including 2.4 GW of offshore wind capacity. A solicitation for the first 800 MW is expected before the end of 2018 and Long Island Power Authority has approved a power purchase agreement to buy 90 MW of electricity from the South Fork Wind Farm, a 15-turbine installation set to begin construction by 2020.

Since taking office, New Jersey governor Phil Murphy has made offshore wind one of his highest priorities. He aims to have 3.5 GW of wind capacity by 2030 and the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities recently approved the country’s largest offshore wind solicitation to date, 1.1 GW. Two more solicitations are anticipated in the next four years.

Virginia is also making plans for offshore wind. Earlier this year an omnibus energy bill was passed that set a target for the state to develop 5.5 GW of renewable energy by 2024, including at least

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Secretary Zinke described offshore wind as a “win for America” and source of abundant and affordable energy for the US

2 GW of offshore wind capacity.The Virginia plan calls for 3 GW of solar and onshore wind to be deployed by 2022, and 2 GW of offshore wind to be deployed by 2028.

Approval is being sought to build two 6-MW offshore wind turbines and the necessary grid infrastructure off the coast of Virginia. Dominion Energy and Ørsted plan to install two 6-MW wind turbines 27 miles off the coast as a pilot project. The facility will serve as a demonstrator for stakeholders like the military, commercial and recreational groups and government agencies.

Published in September 2018, a report said another east coast state, South Carolina, could capitalise on opportunities in the offshore wind industry to drive economic growth and support an annual average of around 850 new jobs every year through 2035.

The South Carolina Jobs Project: A Guide to Creating Jobs in Offshore Wind report was produced by the American Jobs Project (AJP) in partnership with the Burroughs and Chapin Center for Marine and Wetland Studies (BCCMWS) at Coastal Carolina University and BVG Associates.

“Jumpstarting South Carolina’s offshore wind conversation would position us to benefit from this quickly growing sector,” said BCCMWS executive director Paul Gayes. “Right now, there is US$56Bn committed to Atlantic Coast offshore wind projects.

AJP’s report shows that we can leverage South Carolina’s industry strengths to provide support for these projects and nurture local projects that would grow the economy while meeting our energy needs.”

The market is also developing on the west coast of the US, where the California legislature passed Senate Bill 100, which calls for the state to reach 100% clean energy by 2045. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates the state’s net offshore wind capacity at 112 GW with a net annual energy potential of 392 terawatt hours (TWhr), even after excluding areas for military, environmental and other uses. To put this in context, California’s entire 2017 electricity generation from both in-state and imported power sources was 292 TWhr – 100 TWhr less than the state’s

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

8 | AREA REPORT US

• Development rights for up to 3.5 GW at the Ocean Wind site off the coast of New Jersey.

• In Virginia, Ørsted will construct two 6-MW wind turbine positions for phase one of Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project. Ørsted has exclusive rights with Dominion Energy to discuss the potential development of up to 2 GW of offshore wind capacity.

With the combined organisation and asset portfolio, Ørsted will deliver clean energy to the seven states on the US east coast that have already committed to build in total more than 10 GW of offshore wind capacity by 2030.

New Jersey governor Phil Murphy has made offshore wind one of his highest priorities

offshore wind energy potential.

In September 2018 a consortium of companies and a coastal energy authority submitted a lease application to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to advance development of a floating offshore wind energy project 20 miles off the coast of Eureka in northern California. Redwood Coast Energy Authority, Principle Power, EDPR Offshore North America and Aker Solutions have been working since 2017 to develop offshore wind potential off Humboldt County. The 100-150-MW project would consist of 10-15 floating turbines 20 miles off the coast of Eureka, and could come online as soon as 2024.

In Q3 2018, wind energy developer Ørsted secured a particularly strong, long-term growth platform in the US offshore market with the acquisition of Deepwater Wind. The merger created a leading offshore wind platform in the US with the most comprehensive geographic coverage and the largest pipeline of development capacity.

Deepwater Wind has a geographically diverse portfolio of projects along the US east coast and has a portfolio with a potential capacity of approximately 3.3 GW comprising: • Block Island (30 MW), the only operational offshore windfarm in the US. • Three offshore wind development projects in Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maryland and New York totalling 810 MW of capacity with long-term revenue contracts in place or pending finalisation.

• Approximately 2.5 GW of offshore wind development potential across three lease areas in Massachusetts and Delaware. Of these 2.5 GW, 1.2 GW is developed through an equal joint venture with PSEG, a leading New Jersey utility. Ørsted’s current US offshore wind portfolio has a total capacity of approximately 5.5 GW including: • Development rights for up to 2 GW at the Bay State Wind site off the coast of Massachusetts owned in a joint venture with Eversource.

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

Development projects with revenue contracts awarded to the new entity or under negotiation include: • Revolution Wind (600 MW) in Deepwater Wind’s northern Massachusetts-Rhode Island BOEM lease area. Subject to permitting, securing power purchase agreements and final investment decision, Revolution Wind is expected to be commissioned in 2023.

• Skipjack (120 MW), 19 miles from Ocean City, Maryland, which is expected to be commissioned by the end of 2022, subject to permitting, further development and final investment decision.

• Southfork (90 MW): 35 miles east of Long Island, which is due to be commissioned by the end of 2022, subject to the same conditions being fulfilled.

Future development by the newly formed entity include: • Garden State Offshore Energy, a 50-50 joint venture with PSEG, a New Jersey utility and power generation company, that holds the rights to a lease off the coast of Delaware and New Jersey with the potential for 1.2 GW of offshore wind.

• New England lease areas, with Deepwater Wind holding the rights to two areas off the coast of New England with potential for a further 1.3 GW. • Development rights for the up to 2 GW Bay State Wind site off the coast of Massachusetts, and for the up to 3.5-GW Ocean Wind site off the coast of New Jersey.

• Two 6-MW turbines mentioned above that form part of Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia offshore wind project.

The two companies have also signed a memorandum of understanding giving Ørsted exclusive rights to discuss potential development of up to 2 GW of offshore wind capacity. OWJ

Lake Erie opportunity boosted by environmental assessment A federal agency has released a finding of no significant environmental impact for a windfarm developers hope to build in Lake Erie. Lake Erie Development Corporation said an exhaustive federal review of the proposed Icebreaker Lake Erie wind energy project found no significant environmental impact from building the windfarm and that the project would not significantly affect migratory birds.

The US Department of Energy conducted the review in cooperation with the US Army Corps of Engineers, US Coast Guard and other federal entities.

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10 | AREA REPORT JAPAN

Policy and regulation mean Japanese market is approaching a tipping point Long seen as a potentially significant market for offshore wind – and for floating offshore wind in particular – policy developments in Japan could mean it is about to reach the point where projects can actually get underway

T

he emerging offshore wind market in Asia – particularly in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan – is drawing significant interest from international and domestic developers, investors and financiers. Regulatory and policy developments as outlined in a report from Linklaters*, Japan offshore wind: approaching a tipping point, suggest that changes are being watched very closely by the international offshore wind community.

As Linklaters noted, Japan has an ambition of decarbonising its economy by 2050 and offshore wind power is expected to play a key role. However, historically wind power developers faced challenges such as geography, climate conditions and legal/regulatory issues.

Now, however, the combination of new technology – primarily in the form of floating wind turbines – availability of insurance coverage and strong regulatory and policy support in recent months has the potential to unlock the offshore wind market in Japan.

“The industry is gaining momentum and we genuinely believe it is

With water depths exceeding 50 m in 80% of potential locations, Japan is seen primarily as a floating wind market

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

approaching a tipping point,” said the law firm.

Linklaters noted that 10 GW of offshore wind power capacity is required to meet the Japanese Government’s 2030 target (although that appears to be based on a conservative cost assumption). The Japan Wind Power Association predicts 6 GW of fixed turbine windfarms and 4 GW floating turbine windfarms by FY2030 (4.3 GW was already planned as at the end of 2017).

Japan has the seventh longest coastline in the world and 1,600 GW of offshore wind potential. 80% of that offshore wind resource is in deep water, of in excess of 50 m, hence the focus on floating offshore wind. As highlighted elsewhere by OWJ, the good news for Japan is that floating wind technology is becoming commercially feasible, alongside which regulatory and policy changes have been made in Japan in 2018 to address the cost concerns, legal uncertainties and grid availability.

Among the policy and regulatory developments set to ease adoption of offshore wind energy in the country, are amendments to the Port & Harbour Act to allow for offshore wind development in port and harbour areas; a bill on promoting the use of sea areas to develop marine renewable energy facilities; and developing new auction guidelines. Measures to stabilise the grid from intermittency of renewable energy are starting to be addressed.

As Linklaters also reported, another piece of legislation is waiting for approval at the Diet, and the Japanese version of ‘connect and manage’ has freed up significant grid availability since it was implemented in April 2018. At the same time, the government is planning to halve the time required for environmental impact assessment, which was said to be taking at least four years.

“Entrepreneurs, industry bodies and the government have made significant efforts to overcome such challenges in recent years,” said Linklaters, noting that 3.8 GW of fixed-turbine projects are under development and waiting for the environmental impact assessment to be completed, and that the 2-MW prototype floating turbine off the coast of Fukushima has demonstrated it is commercially viable – and has withstood sometimes severe conditions.

“As Japan catches up, in many ways the issues faced are similar to countries in Europe. Japan is learning from the success experienced in Europe but a very steep learning curve is expected,” said the authors of Linklaters’ report. “The whole industry is gaining momentum and we believe it is about to reach a tipping point.

“10 GW of new offshore wind power capacity by FY2030 is what would be required to achieve the government’s 2030 energy mix target for wind, and yet, this is a modest target that would require

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JAPAN AREA REPORT | 11

Growth potential of wind power in Japan (source: Japan Wind Power Association)

wind (offshore and onshore combined) to be only 1.7% of the nation’s expected power generation capacity at that point in time.”

The law firm reported the government’s 2030 energy mix target is intended to be realistic and is based on the notion that, as it currently stands, there is no single energy source that satisfies all four of the underlying principles of Japan’s strategic energy policy – energy security, cost efficiency, environmental impact and, the overarching principle, safety (3E+S).

“The government would need to maintain all options available and consider the optimal mix based on certain assumptions,” said Linklaters. “There is recognition that offshore wind power can be cost competitive on an individual project basis if it benefits from economies of scale, but there remain concerns around the overall cost to end consumers due to the combination of the feed-in tariff and, given the intermittency, costs associated with back-up generation capacity and energy storage. “However, what if the cost assumptions change?”

The Japanese government unveiled its 5th Strategic Energy Plan in July 2018, and the following points are worth noting in relation to renewable energy. Firstly, the government reaffirmed its commitment to achieve its 2030 energy target, under which renewable sources will account for 22% to 24% of the total energy mix. The government also pledged to work towards making renewable energy the main power source.

Among the renewable energy sources, the government’s key observations on wind power include that, if deployed on a larger scale, its cost could become comparable to that of thermal power. It has challenges in relation to the grid and would benefit from better power grid integration and developing energy storage solutions. The government will also support the technology development required to promote floating offshore wind.

As Linklaters noted, it is the Japanese Government’s ambition to become a global leader in floating wind technology. It recognises the leading position of European countries in bottom-fixed

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technology, based on their long experience in the North Sea, but feels there is room for Japan to become a global leader in floating technology, not least because it has a limited number of suitable sites in sufficiently shallow water for economically viable fixed foundations to be deployed.

While floating technologies are still in a nascent state, numerous countries are investing to commercialise the technology and develop floating wind turbines at scale. The opportunity is significant, although as Linklaters also highlighted, the challenges are evident when reviewing the performance to date of the Fukushima Forward floating test site where, reports suggest, the three turbines at the test site (2 MW, 5 MW and 7 MW) are currently producing less electricity than initially anticipated.

“While the capacity factor – the ratio of actual to maximum possible output – for new wind turbines should be around 30%, only one of the three turbines has actually reached this value: the 2-MW turbine even achieved a slightly higher result of 34% in the past two years. The 5-MW turbine, which was commissioned in February 2017, only managed 12%, the 7-MW turbine just 2%,” Linklaters said, although it noted the performance of the Hywind Scotland windfarm in the UK has exceeded expectations, achieving an average capacity factor of 65% at times.

“Wind energy, in particular offshore wind energy, plays a key role in the Japanese Government’s 5th Energy Strategy,” said Linklaters. “Looking at the developments in 2018, we think the government is mobilising all sources to achieve the 2030 target.

Given the scale of potential development, there is broad consensus that the potential benefits of offshore wind power development to the wider economy are huge.

“The political concern is cost. If the cost concern is addressed – following the recent rapid tariff reductions in the UK, albeit for bottom-mounted offshore wind – there is a possibility the Japanese Government target could, in the end, be exceeded. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

12 | NEW MARKETS

New FITs agreed for Vietnamese wind projects but challenges aplenty remain Vietnam could be a significant market for offshore wind, but the country’s government needs help with policy, regulation and planning to make it possible

I

n September 2018, the prime minister of Vietnam approved a draft decision on new feed-in tariffs (FITs) for onshore and offshore wind power projects in the country, but before commercial-scale projects can get underway there are a host of challenges to address, as delegates at the Global Wind Energy Council’s (GWEC’s) first Vietnam Wind Power conference heard.

Organised by GWEC in partnership with Vietnam’s Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and the Embassy of Denmark, the event attracted more than 200 delegates from over 40 countries and was intended to enable companies interested in developing the wind sector in Vietnam to meet and discuss with government officials what needs to be done for the wind industry to grow and remain sustainable.

The prime minister’s decision (known as Decision 39), was due to become effective on 1 November 2018 and will amend and revise articles in the prime minister’s decision No. 37/2011/QD-TTg on mechanisms supporting the development of wind power projects in Vietnam. For onshore projects, the FIT will be increased from its current level of US$0.078/kWhr to US$0.085/kWhr. The tariff for offshore wind projects will be US$0.098/kWhr. Discussing the decision, and definitions of what constitutes onshore and offshore projects, Duane Morris Vietnam general director Dr Oliver Massmann said he

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

believed Vietnam’s ministry of industry and trade needed to provide further guidelines and a better definition of ‘onshore’ and ‘offshore’ wind power projects. Another law firm following the development of the new FITs, Baker McKenzie, agreed.

The new FITs apply to a part or the whole of a wind power project that achieves a commercial operation date (COD) before 1 November 2021 and will apply for 20 years from the COD. For wind power projects that achieve COD prior to the effective date of the prime minister’s decision, that is 1 November 2018, the new FITs apply for the remaining term of the power purchase agreement.

As Baker McKenzie also noted, the prime minister instructed the MOIT to propose a mechanism to encourage the development

Peter Brun told the conference that fast-tracking offshore wind and leap-frogging onshore wind was in Vietnam’s best interest (photo: GWEC)

and manufacturing of domestic wind power equipment and increase the local content of wind power projects in Vietnam.

As previously highlighted by OWJ, Vietnam has significant nearshore and offshore wind potential but needs to reform its energy sector and develop competition-based generation and a wholesale and resale market to attract the foreign investment it needs to develop wind energy and solar projects. It also faces challenges such as developing windfarms in typhoon-prone areas, local supply-chain limits and sometimes challenging seabed conditions offshore.

As one of the speakers at the event, DNV GL’s global offshore wind segment leader Peter Brun, noted, he is optimistic that there could soon be major developments and “significant decisions” taken on Vietnam’s energy system but highlighted that less than 200 MW of offshore wind has been installed there to date, despite the huge unexploited wind power potential in the country.

“Vietnam is in a situation where the country needs to go for energy technology which can be brought online fast, such as solar and wind,” he said, noting it has a very capable industry and is already a global supplier to the energy sector and other industries.

In fact, one of the leading tower suppliers – South Korean-owned CS Wind – has a sizable factory in the Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province, as does another producer, Vina Halla Heavy Industries, and GE has a wind

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Tobias Cossen told the Vietnam Wind Power conference that Vietnam needs support to develop policy and regulation for offshore wind (photo: GWEC)

turbine generator factory in Hai Phong.

“All these local suppliers have come to be in Vietnam because of the country’s industrial offering, quality and competitive prices,” he explained. “But Vietnam has much more supplier potential for the wind industry than is already there, and is very well positioned to harvest not only many manufacturing jobs, but jobs in installation and operations and maintenance.”

However, as he pointed out, the permitting process in Vietnam is “very complex and cumbersome” and the country has at least 29 individual permits, agreements or licences for utility-scale windfarms. There are many government agencies involved at state and regional level, he explained – at least 12 different agencies, counties and ministries. The approval process ranges from a few days to several months and the entire process can take years.

Another significant barrier facing investors and developers of wind energy projects in Vietnam is the lack of available project finance. There is a lack of local finance and the Vietnamese power purchasing agreements do not follow international standards in the areas of force majeure, offtake interruptions, dispute resolution, grid connectivity, change in law and tariff escalation.

As Mr Brun also explained, “failure to provide full currency guarantees is a serious problem for bringing in international capital and international public finance to

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Vietnamese wind projects. The only way to currently finance wind projects is through Overseas Development Aid-financed or equity-financed projects setting certain limits to scale.”

A third significant barrier for larger wind power installation in Vietnam is the country’s weak grid system and competition with solar PV, which is rapidly expanding in the country and could ‘cannibalise’ grid capacity for wind projects.

“Looking at the issues and opportunities facing Vietnam to capture its wind potential, a realistic approach for onshore wind will likely be slow development owing to some of the barriers and mitigating actions described above,” Mr Brun said. “This will take time to overcome and implement.

With that in mind and the aggressive scaling power demand for the expanding Vietnamese economy, the government should seriously consider leapfrogging to opportunities in offshore wind.

“Vietnam has exceptional offshore and near-coast wind opportunities. Offshore wind conditions not far from large loadcentres, such as Ho Chi Minh city, have great potential according to the World Bank Energy Sector Management Assistance Programme and with reasonable water depths between 20 m and 50 m, this could easily be a wonderful opportunity for Vietnam to add yet more global suppliers to its fledgling wind industry.

“Vietnam could quickly acquire obvious competences in supply, offshore

foundations and substructures, creating new jobs and diversifying the industry,” Mr Brun concluded. “Fast-tracking offshore wind planning appears to be the right decision for Vietnam right now, where offshore wind technology is entering the region quickly thanks to the investment made in Taiwan.

“Because of a mix of conditions described above, Vietnam should consider taking a dual strategy planning for its wind power strategy, but there is certainly also a strong socio-economic business case for fast-tracking planning of the development of its vast offshore wind potential.”

In a presentation he gave at the conference, head of wind projects at the MOIT/GIZ energy support programme Tobias Cossen also highlighted lack of access to finance as an issue, along with complex and unclear investment procedures.

Mr Cossen said Vietnam needs a national wind power development programme, and support and advice is required to enable Vietnam to develop a suitable legal and regulatory environment.

He also highlighted the need for capacity development and technology co-operation, the need to develop guidelines for environmental and social impact assessment, to provide support to developers to enable them to obtain finance for projects in the country and identify what kind of support mechanisms and feed-in tariffs would work best in the long term. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

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CONDITION MONITORING | 15

Drones, AI and IoT to make on-demand detection and monitoring a reality Service companies and technology providers are planning to use drones, artificial intelligence, advanced sensors, wireless networks, the internet of things and smartphone apps to automate fault detection in turbines

Lab tests at Fraunhofer IWES provided convincing results prior to real-world tests on Meerwind Süd and Meerwind Ost

C

oncepts for inspecting the rotor blades of offshore wind turbines using thermography and acoustic monitoring to detect potential issues with turbines before they become potentially damaging were presented by experts from Deutsche WindGuard and the University of Bremen, Bremen Institute for Metrology, WindMW Service, Fraunhofer IWES and the Bremer Institut für Messtechnik, Automatisierung und Qualitätswissenschaft (BIMAQ) in Germany.

They described a concept developed and tested on the Meerwind Süd and Meerwind Ost offshore windfarms off the coast of Heligoland in northern Germany designed to reduce the need to use rope access climbers to inspect turbines. “Their use either as independent systems or in combination with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) will enable more efficient, safer monitoring,”

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they said in a poster presentation at the Global Wind Summit in Hamburg in September.

The objectives of a project they recently completed were to apply non-destructive testing and structural health monitoring techniques for enhanced rotor blade monitoring. Thermography was applied to detect potential structural issues; acoustics integrated into the turbine were used to detect potential problems within the structure.

The acoustic emission measuring system integrated in the rotor blade served as an early warning system by detecting internal damage, for example at the root of the rotor blade. The thermal imaging camera, on the other hand, detects surface damage, such as that caused by erosion due to rain. Acoustic emission and piezoelectric sensors were attached to the inner surface of the rotor blades in structurally relevant areas – especially at known weak

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

16 | CONDITION MONITORING

points. A processor that collected and analysed the sensor data was integrated in the rotor hub.

Structural defects cause friction which in turn generates heat, and the heat flow in the material can be detected by thermal imaging.

The project used a passive thermography technique, which detects differences in temperature. Deutsche WindGuard Engineering and BIMAQ have been applying thermal surveying to visualise heat flow in onshore windfarms for several years. The challenge in this particular project was to adapt this proven technique to the requirements of offshore installations.

The sensors work in much the same way as microphones. If the tensile forces in a specific area of the rotor blade suddenly change, the structure releases energy in the form of heat and surface waves that can be measured by the sensors. The sound waves captured by each sensor have different signal delays. By analysing their arrival times, it is possible to pinpoint the source of the damage. The acoustic measuring system delivered convincing results during lab tests at Fraunhofer IWES and was tested in a real-world scenario, along with the thermographic system, in early 2018 on Meerwind Süd and Meerwind Ost. By attaching thermal imaging cameras to UAVs or ‘drones’ it is possible to detect subsurface defects in composite materials, including delamination, inclusions, faulty bonding in the loadbearing web-flange joints, and shrinkage cavities. Under operational loads, defects deep inside the rotor blade, if not detected and dealt with in good time, can lead to more serious structural damage and eventually lead to a total breakdown.

The UAV-compatible infrared system was tested against a high-end camera and found to be able to ‘visualise’ structures below the surface of the blade. The acoustic emissions system was able to evaluate large amounts of data in a relatively short timeframe while detecting potential damage and eliminating acoustic noise.

During static rotor blade and fatigue tests, the researchers identified damage including adhesive and inter-fibre fractures, damage to web-flange joints, cracks in the trailing edge of rotor blades, and faulty bonding in the blade root area.

Turbine monitoring using AI and drones

Without using innovative techniques such as the ones being pioneered in Germany, accessing offshore wind turbines in winter can be particularly difficult. To address this issue, Wind Power Lab, which specialises in using artificial intelligence (AI) to assess blades, and service operation vessel owner Esvagt have teamed up to apply drone technology and AI techniques to turbine monitoring.

Together they aim to develop a ‘service train’ concept to detect faults on offshore wind turbines using drones. Under this concept, windfarm owners could book blade data acquisition and automated blade defect assessments. “The process is that simple,” said Esvagt.

“You book your desired number of turbines for a blade inspection and decide on a deadline for your blade defect assessment.

Together, Esvagt and Wind Power Lab have formed a joint venture, EWPL Ocean, with Anders Røpke as chief executive.

“EWPL Ocean will be able to deliver a unique product portfolio that will help offshore windfarm owners and operators into a more industrialised world,” said Mr Røpke.

“For an agreed, fixed fee, customers can have high-quality images taken by drones and analysed with a best-in-class AI setup delivered by Wind Power LAB. It means that windfarm owners no longer need to worry about weather risks or logistics. Our AI technology can detect flaws as small as 1 mm wide. EWPL Ocean

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

then provides a detailed report in a timely manner, allowing turbine owners to generate data-driven repair campaigns for the upcoming repair season.”

EWPL Ocean was launched in September 2018. Its blade assessment service is available this coming winter season, a time of year usually characterised by very limited offshore inspections due to the weather. The company summarises the advantages of the concept thus: no weather downtime when manned access is not possible; no access required to turbines; assessments of turbine condition ‘on demand’; service is available year-round.

iWindCr project

Avonwood Developments, with partners Avanti Communications and the University of Portsmouth in the UK, used the wind summit to present a poster about the intelligent real-time corrosion monitoring and detection on offshore wind turbines (iWindCr) project they are working on.

The project is co-funded by the Energy Catalyst and aims to develop cost-effective technology comprising sensors and advanced software plus end-user applications for detecting and monitoring corrosion and surface damage on wind turbines. The outcome of the project is expected to improve turbine lifespan, output and reliability by reducing the O&M costs from unplanned or unscheduled maintenance caused by corrosion and surface damage.

The real-time remote sensing technology they are developing is designed to provide autonomous detection and monitoring, providing exhaustive and detailed data on corrosion processes. At the heart of the iWindCr project is technology that can measure changes in the electrochemical states – such as potential, current or resistivity – of components.

The iWindCr proof-of-concept system consists of a wireless sensor network of smart miniaturised sensors fixed to internal or external turbine structures. It utilises the concept of the internet of things to integrate the wireless network with satellite and terrestrial communications networks, providing a guaranteed IP for data backhaul from remote sites to a control room. Power would be provided by solar power.

The system will use a cloud-based solution for predictive analyses of corrosion/surface damage trends and notify authorised stakeholders through web and smartphone apps. OWJ Esvagt has teamed up with Wind Power Lab to offer windfarm owners an ‘on-demand’ turbine monitoring service

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18 | TURBINE TECHNOLOGY

Technology can take us to 20 MW, turbine and blade builders say With new, much larger turbines in development, the offshore wind industry is looking at ways to enhance manufacturing processes and further reduce costs through standardisation

The BladeFactory research project could result in rotor blades that can be produced more quickly and with a higher quality result

I

ndustry leaders presenting at the Global Wind Summit in Hamburg in September described the development of offshore wind turbines that could soon be far larger than existing marques and said they see few technical barriers to developing units as large as 20 MW, with rotors of up to 240 m in diameter.

As MHI Vestas unveiled a 10-MW turbine at Wind Energy Hamburg in a conference session at the summit dedicated to future offshore wind turbines, representatives of turbine builders such as Senvion and blade builders such as LM Wind Power discussed developing next-generation turbines that will be far more powerful than existing models and even MHI Vestas’ new unit.

Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables senior analyst Shashi Barla told delegates the market will see 15-20-MW turbines by 2030 and highlighted the cost reduction potential of 12-15-MW units already under development. “We don’t see any limitations for technology growth,” he told the conference.

Senvion chief technology officer Servet Sert described the development of Senvion’s 10-MW offshore wind turbine – which has already morphed into a 12-MW unit with growth potential beyond that– and highlighted the challenges in developing such a huge turbine. First and foremost is increased blade length, he said, and the need for new control systems for such a large turbine.

Mr Sert said larger turbines would continue to drive down the levelised cost of energy, but they need to be developed “at the right cost.” He described new-generation turbines with rotor

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

diameters exceeding 200 m, but highlighted challenges that needed to be addressed before units of this size entered production. These include fatigue loads on such massive units, and the challenge of manufacturing the blades for such large turbines. Compared with existing turbines, “a 12-MW turbine needs a new control system,” he told delegates. “You will need more dynamic control.”

‘Is there a limit to blade length?’ was the subject LM Wind’s senior director, engineering and power excellence, John Korsgaard was tasked with talking about.

He explained the cost of a blade is about 6-8% of the overall cost of a turbine. Longer and longer blades are going to be more and more expensive, but they can help reduce the levelised cost of energy, and a relatively small increase in blade length can significantly increase annual energy production.

As highlighted by OWJ on a number of occasions, LM Wind has already produced an 88.4-m blade and is going to develop a 107-m blade for GE’s Haliade-X. Mr Korsgaard said the first blade for the Haliade-X will be produced by the end of the year and also highlighted challenges involved in building such massive blades.

He said they included aerodynamics and that longer blades mean a significant increase in mass. Like Mr Sert, he highlighted the challenge of control systems for very long blades and the need for new, advanced control systems that can reduce loads.

As blades get longer and longer so their mass becomes more and more of an issue, but that issue is one LM Wind has already begun

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TURBINE TECHNOLOGY | 19

to address using new materials, such as carbon fibre. Its new 5.3MW onshore turbine, Cypress, makes extensive use of carbon and has a novel two-piece blade design. However, carbon fibre has issues of its own said Mr Korsgaard – it’s a conductor, so if you go down that route, lightning protection is more of an issue.

As blades get longer and longer, so transporting them has become more and more of a challenge. One way of addressing this is a two-piece blade. What role will two-piece blades one day play offshore? A two-piece blade would be easier to build, transport and install offshore, if it were technically suited to the harsh offshore environment. Might we see a two-piece offshore blade before long?

Mr Korsgaard went on to say that a 20-MW turbine with a 250m rotor diameter is “perfectly feasible” and presented a slide showing a graph of the growth in blade length. The growth curve went all the way up to 140 m.

MHI Vestas is one of three of the world’s largest turbine manufacturers to have developed a list of components and systems they believe could be standardised to drive innovation and reduce costs in the installation and O&M phases of windfarms.

The components and systems have been identified by Siemens Gamesa, Vestas and MHI Vestas working in unison with Megavind, a strategic partnership in the Danish wind industry in which industry, academia and government meet and work together to chart a course for wind energy R&D, testing and demonstration.

The ‘hot list’ the turbine manufacturers have identified was due to be unveiled at this year’s Wind Energy Denmark event, which brings together Danish and international industry to discuss innovation, technology development and collaboration between the industry and the world of research.

“The industry needs to find common ground on future cost reduction,” said the Danish Wind Industry Association. “This calls for communication, co-ordination and collaboration between all of the stakeholders in the industry – utilities, OEMs, suppliers and research institutions. “Vestas, Siemens Gamesa and MHI Vestas have taken up this challenge and defined areas which are ‘core’ and ‘non-core.’”

“There is a strong focus on closer collaboration between

manufacturers and suppliers. In launching this list Wind Energy Denmark invites industry to prioritise collaboration across the value chain and take the next steps in realising cost reduction,” said MHI Vestas chief technology officer Torben Hvid Larsen, noting that he expects the list will prompt innovation projects in the next 2-3 years.

“For cost reduction potential to be fully utilised, industry and the research world must follow a common research and innovation strategy that ensures a joint focus on the specific areas of greatest potential and the ‘easy pickings’ in terms of reducing the levelised cost of energy,” the Danish association said.

Better quality, faster-to-produce blades could result from a R&D project led by Fraunhofer IWES in Germany. It heads a 14-member industry team that has launched a project that aims to find ways to produce blades for wind turbines more quickly and to higher quality standards. The BladeFactory project was launched at the beginning of October 2018 with Fraunhofer IWES as co-ordinator.

The research project, funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy to the tune of €7M (US$8M), is set to last 3.5 years. During this period, IWES researchers will develop and test production techniques that can reduce the time it takes to manufacture rotor blades. The industry team is working on ways to productionise the new techniques and on a 3D laser measurement system for blade quality assurance. Development work will be undertaken at IWES’ demonstration centre for industrialised rotor blade production in Bremerhaven, Germany, a facility established within the context of the earlier BladeMaker project.

Using existing technology, it takes around 24 hours to produce a rotor blade blank. “To shorten the production time, we want to undertake processes simultaneously and move some of the work away from the main mould tool to other devices,” explained Fraunhofer IWES project manager Roman Braun. This includes procedures such as preforming (placement of the textile and core materials) and prefabbing (preproduction of rotor blade components). It is hoped the laser measurement system the team is working on, which will precisely record the 3D geometry of the finished parts, will help increase the accuracy of production. OWJ

As blades get longer and longer, so their mass becomes more and more of an issue

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Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

20 | FINANCE

Collaboration could further reduce costs – but industry might have to lead the way Shared projects, shared tenders and joint R&D projects could see lowcost offshore windfarms and interconnectors criss-crossing the North Sea, but Europe should beware of the effects of Brexit and potential competitors investing in the market

R

ecent months have seen growing recognition that crossborder collaboration in offshore wind can advance the rollout of renewable energy in the North Sea, enhance energy security and continue to drive down the cost of energy.

In mid-July, a Franco-German declaration was signed in Paris that could see the countries collaborate on offshore wind and other renewable energy initiatives. Both countries will launch initiatives to realise a part of their respective national renewable energy deployment through joint pilot projects, such as offshore wind in the North Sea. The declaration said France and Germany would work on requirements for implementing a test project for cross-border renewable energy auctions, increase their interconnection capacity, and strengthen networks that currently constrain capacity.

France and Germany also agreed to work together on batteries and other forms of energy storage and strengthen co-operation on hydrogen produced from renewable power as an energy carrier.

As highlighted in a recent feature on the Belgium, offshore

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

The cost of offshore wind energy could fall further if there were more collaboration between countries, analysis by IFRI suggests

wind industry, extra-national collaboration is already being discussed between the UK, Netherlands and Belgium. Trilateral ‘cluster’ projects under discussion include Nautilus, a second interconnector between the UK and Belgium, and a proposal to connect a large offshore windfarm in UK waters to Belgium or the Netherlands. Projects like this are growing in number and coming closer to realisation.

Dutch transmission systems operator TenneT has proposed a European electricity system based on a North Sea hub on an artificial island to which numerous offshore windfarms could be connected and transmit electricity to North Sea countries; and Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands last year signed an agreement to press ahead with plans for a pan-European electricity transmission system in the North Sea. It has even been suggested that before long, country-specific offshore windfarms and transmission assets “will no longer be relevant.”

The latest organisation to highlight the benefits of cross-border collaboration is the Institut français des relations internationales (IFRI). Michel Cruciani, author of an IFRI report, L’essor de l’éolien offshore en mer du Nord: un enjeu stratégique pour l’Europe, said purely national policies enacted in countries in the region such as the UK, Belgium, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands had undoubtedly encouraged deployment of offshore wind, but crossborder, international co-ordination could guarantee the integration of “massive” wind production at the least cost.

“Undoubtedly, offshore wind in the North Sea is already a success story but it is now time to develop a broader, more strategic vision, looking at how to make the most out of this incredible potential and also derive lessons for the other European shores,” he said.

Speaking to OWJ, Mr Cruciani said collaboration between countries could take several forms, including collaboration to unify tendering procedures, the duration of contracts, the level of financial support, premiums and decommissioning requirements.

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FINANCE | 21

“This would simplify the assessment of projects by financial actors, and thus lead to a reduction in the cost of capital,” he said.

Collaborative tendering involving all EU member states – including countries that do not have access to the North Sea – could also take place, Mr Cruciani suggested, a procedure anticipated in the Clean Energy Package being adopted in the EU. “It would accelerate the decarbonisation of the economy, because the North Sea is a very important source of renewable energy at a reasonable price,” he said.

Collaboration on interconnectors could also have significant benefits. “All variable energy sources require a high network density to provide optimal operating conditions. By synchronising the development of offshore windfarms with the realisation of interconnections, we reduce the risk of network congestion and adverse effects on prices,” Mr Cruciani told OWJ. Mr Cruciani and his colleagues at IFRI also anticipate collaboration in other areas, such as floating offshore wind.

Like the French and German governments, he anticipates collaboration on energy storage and ways to convert renewable energy from intermittent sources into energy carriers such as hydrogen and ammonia.

However, as Mr Cruciani pointed out, collaboration of the types that could significantly reduce the levelised cost of energy from offshore wind will not be easy, and there are potential barriers.

“All studies converge on the need to strengthen interconnections if offshore wind is to be built out at much greater scale,” he said.

“Currently, all windfarms are connected to the mainland, but in future a common hub between windfarms could be connected to an interconnector. Others have argued in favour of a ‘meshed grid.’

The consortium considering a large hub located in the North Sea suggested that co-ordinated planning of investments and using a central hub could reduce the cost of an interconnector by 30%.”

Brexit complications

The problem is, he said, that for the time being support schemes and the level of support vary between countries and “co-ordination of decisions will become even more difficult with Brexit.” In leaving the EU, the UK will no longer be bound by common commitments on renewable energy, its grid operators will no longer participate

in European clearing mechanisms, and its electricity market may adopt different rules to those in place in Europe. The EU is also possibly losing a very active participant in European offshore wind research programmes.

“It seems likely that innovations in co-ordination will come from industry rather than political bodies, “ Mr Cruciani said. “Everything suggests that Brexit will complicate or even make it impossible to set up a purely political governance scheme.”

Asian investment

As a recent report from Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables highlighted, Chinese operators remain the leaders of the global wind asset market. The report, Global Wind Power Asset Ownership 2018, noted Chinese asset owners continue to dominate the global wind power sector following the merger of former top-ranked power producers. In offshore wind, four large utilities dominate the capital-intensive market, typically developing and selling off around 50% of their projects to a more fragmented pool of institutional investors. The growth of the offshore wind sector will affect asset ownership in Asia Pacific from 2022 onwards, boosting the utility market share in Japan and South Korea.

Mr Cruciani highlighted the growing investment in the European offshore wind industry by extra-European actors in Japan, South Korea and China. As highlighted previously by OWJ, Sumitomo Group has invested heavily in Belgian offshore windfarms, and Mitsubishi has invested in the offshore wind market in the Netherlands and the UK. “Chinese players are also active in the European offshore wind market,” Mr Cruciani said. These include China Resources Corporation, China Three Gorges Corporation and China Yangtze Power Corporation.

“For all of these stakeholders, acquiring know-how in Europe will facilitate the penetration of international markets. Such knowhow includes technical skills, but also the economic and legal set-up of projects,” Mr Cruciani concluded, noting that several of the countries investing in European projects will almost certainly want to use the experience they gain in the fast-growing export market for offshore wind in countries such as Australia, Brazil, India, Taiwan, Turkey, the US and Vietnam. OWJ

EU supports floating wind technology

Michel Cruciani: “cross-border, international co-ordination could guarantee the integration of massive offshore wind production at the least cost”

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Portuguese company Windplus will has secured a €60M loan under the InnovFin Energy Demonstration Project programme to install a floating windfarm off the coast of Portugal. Windplus is a subsidiary of EDP Renewables, Repsol and Principle Power.

Located 20 km off the Viana do Castelo coast, the project will speed up the commercial roll-out of a novel technology based on the WindFloat platform. The loan is being granted by the European Investment Bank (EIB) and supported by the European Commission through the Energy Demonstration Projects facility, a thematic investment programme under InnovFin – EU Finance for Innovators, which works with funding from the EU's research and innovation programme Horizon 2020. The project will also receive funding from the EU’s NER300 programme and the Portuguese Carbon Fund.

The floating windfarm will consist of three wind turbines on WindFloat foundations that will be anchored to the seabed at a depth of 100 m. The windfarm will have an installed capacity of 25 MW.

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

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FOUNDATIONS | 23

US foundations face multiple challenges

In Europe, developers such as Ørsted have used a business model based around monopiles – but will they be equally suited to conditions in the US?

The US stands ready to take advantage of the development of new, large turbines for offshore wind and cost reduction achieved in the European market, but when it comes to foundations the picture is more complex

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T

here is currently one, small offshore windfarm off the coast of the US, with five turbines and a total capacity of 30 MW. Several large-scale projects are about to take off, including one of 800 MW, but although the US has long built structures for the offshore oil and gas industry, there is a dearth of experience in engineering, manufacturing and installing foundations for offshore wind energy.

Seabed conditions off the east coast of the US differ from many of the sites exploited for offshore wind in Europe.

Unlike Europe, the US does not, at least yet, have a large number of companies able to

manufacture foundations and the picture of what kind of foundations will be used for offshore windfarms off the US east coast is complicated by states’ desires to provide jobs and undertake manufacturing.

In the US, it is states that determine energy policy. Politicians in states such as Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, Maine and others want to invest in clean energy and build offshore windfarms, and they want their region to get a share of the work.

The first – and to date only – offshore windfarm in the US, Block Island, made use of jacket foundations, but it is unclear what the best foundations might be for upcoming projects. Monopiles have been the preferred

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

24 | FOUNDATIONS

choice for many, if not all, projects in Europe, and in particular for projects by leading developer Ørsted.

Another question that needs to be addressed is how best to industrialise the production of foundations in the US: producing foundations for offshore wind requires series production of multiple units, sometimes on a very large scale, quite unlike the oil and gas business. Without a way to successfully industrialise and mass produce foundations, the opportunities for cost reduction will be limited.

To get a clearer idea of what the best kind of foundations might be for offshore windfarms off the east coast of the US,OWJ spoke to Cameron Dunn, who leads Arup's offshore wind efforts across the US. Mr Dunn has in-depth technical expertise focused primarily on offshore engineering and is a professional engineer with offshore and onshore consulting engineering experience. He told OWJ that any developer planning to build a windfarm off the US east coast would first need to undertake very detailed site inspections to determine the nature of the seabed.

“In the northern east coast area, the seabed is predominantly glacial till,” Mr Dunn explained. Glacial till has formed the basis of the seabed in some offshore windfarms in Europe, but not all glacial till is alike, Mr Dunn said. In the northern east coast region of the US it consists of a lot of loose sand, but with boulders in that sand that could make piling tricky. As he pointed out, this is complicated by the fact that as turbines have grown in size and capacity, so monopile foundations have grown, and are growing, in size and as they grow so ‘errata’ – such as boulders – could be more of a problem.

Developers such as Ørsted – which have developed a business model based around using monopiles – should take note, he said. Jackets could be an alternative, having three to four smaller piles. While not eliminating the potential to have installation issues, the jacket would be stable even if the piles encountered boulders or installation problems.

Other types of foundation could also be used in the US market. They include gravity-base foundations and suction buckets, which have been proposed for Lake Erie Development Corporation’s Icebreaker project in the Great Lakes. All are ‘possible’ Mr Dunn agreed, but each has its advantages and disadvantages, and each represents a different kind of engineering and manufacturing challenge for the supply

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

Cameron Dunn (Arup): “There are numerous challenges regarding foundations for offshore wind on the US east coast”

chain in the US. Steps have already been taken by at least one leading European manufacturer of foundations, EEW SPC, to bring its expertise to the US market. In April 2018, Bay State Wind, the 50/50 partnership between Ørsted and Eversource, the New England transmission builder, entered into an agreement with EEW, the steel pipe manufacturer, to open a facility in Massachusetts to manufacture offshore wind components.

Bay State Wind and EEW will collaborate with Gulf Island Fabrication, which specialises in building for the offshore oil and gas industry. Together, the companies plan to use specialised steel manufacturing technology not currently utilised in the US. The companies plan to build a new manufacturing and loadout facility they anticipate will generate approximately 500 annual construction jobs with up to 1,200 additional annual indirect jobs in the local community. They will work together to produce monopile foundations and transition pieces, including secondary steel components, painting and pre-fabricated components for foundations.

Other similar agreements between European companies with expertise in foundations and US entities keen to get involved in the market must be under

discussion. There are companies in the Gulf states that have long built jacket-type foundations for structures for offshore oil and gas, which would like to become involved. Gulf Island is one of the biggest, then there are companies such as Kiewit with a fabrication facility in Texas and five or six others that could play a role in fabricating structures.

“Engineering jackets is not going to be a problem for the supply chain in the US,” Mr Dunn said, but building large numbers of them and transporting jackets built in the southern US for installation in the northeast could be costly. Further, building jackets in the southern US would not provide the employment opportunities that politicians in offshore wind states crave.

“Jackets are essentially made of tubulars and require specialist welding skills. For large and extra-large monopiles for new-generation turbines you are going to need a fairly sophisticated facility that can roll steel, and for gravity-base structures the requirements are different again,” Mr Dunn told OWJ. “Another issue is portside infrastructure. Where would the load-out ports and storage facilities for east coast offshore wind energy be?”

All in all, said Mr Dunn, there are serious questions that need to be answered in the coming months about what kind of foundations to use, who might manufacture them, where they would be manufactured and how and from where offshore wind projects in the northeast will be staged.

That is before issues such as the dearth of installation vessels in the US market begin to be addressed, not to mention potential environmental concerns that would need to be looked at, such as the potential effect of noise created by piling on marine mammals, such as the northern right whale.

Gravity-base foundations do not require piling and installing suction bucket foundations does not create the same kind of noise as driving a monopile into the seabed, so might be an option, but they are less well-suited to use in gravelly soils. The latter might be better suited to use farther south on the eastern seaboard, Mr Dunn suggested, where the seabed is of a silty/sandy type.

“One of the keys to this whole process is going to be making use of the expertise in the Gulf of Mexico and generating sufficient interest in investment on the east coast,” Mr Dunn concluded. OWJ

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26 | FLOATING OFFSHORE WIND

Floating wind sector seeks route to market and ways to industrialise Floating offshore wind has huge potential, but where will the first commercialscale projects be built, by whom, and is there sufficient political support in Europe for the sector, despite it being a massive potential export market?

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Emma Pinchbeck (RenewableUK): “The UK needs to get hold of this brand new market and own it or risk losing out to other countries”

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

loating Offshore Wind UK 2018 in Aberdeen in October provided an excellent opportunity to take the temperature of the floating wind energy market.

Currently, the main potential markets in Europe for floating wind include France, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and the UK, which have large, deep territorial waters, significant wind resources and high population and industrial activity densities near the coastline. There is also a very significant export market for floating offshore wind.

UK industry bodies believe floating wind has an important role to play in supporting the development of the offshore wind supply chain and can contribute to 50 GW of offshore wind in the UK by 2050. But although it is widely seen as the next ‘wave’ of offshore wind, the floating wind segment does not yet enjoy the high level of political support afforded to the UK’s bottomfixed offshore wind segment. It is not expected to receive emphasis in the upcoming Sector Deal the offshore wind industry is negotiating with the government, and although pilot projects are under way and Hywind Scotland has been acclaimed as a massive success, the conference heard that commercialscale floating wind projects are unlikely to be realised in the UK until the second half of the next decade. Moreover, early floating wind projects in the UK will need

to compete with bottom-fixed projects, where costs have fallen steeply.

So why all the excitement about floating wind? The reason is that, as wind energy veteran Henrik Stiesdal told delegates at the event, “windfarms in shallow water are an anomaly” and “most future demand for offshore wind will come from deepwater, which means floating wind.”

Political support for floating wind may be a little lukewarm in the UK, partly because there remain plenty of shallow water opportunities in its waters, but speakers and delegates at the event agreed that opportunities for floating wind are developing quickly in other countries and floating wind is likely to take off first outside the UK unless government realises its massive export potential.

RenewableUK’s executive director Emma Pinchbeck told the conference the UK “needs to get hold of this brand new market and own it,” or risk losing out to other countries.

France, where bottom-fixed offshore windfarms have been held up for years, is pressing ahead with floating wind demonstrations and with an upcoming commercial-scale tender. In Norway, which has no offshore windfarms, two areas on the continental shelf are being opened up for demonstration/pilot projects that will provide an opportunity for industry to innovate and learn, enabling Norwegian technology and competence to develop in

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FLOATING OFFSHORE WIND | 27

order to compete in a quickly evolving and growing global market.

Some almost purely floating wind markets – such as Japan – are expected to be huge.

Floating wind is also taking off on the west coast of the US. Most attendees at the event agreed that the first commercial floating windfarms will probably not be built in the UK, although the potential for floaters is being considered by Crown Estate Scotland as part of its recently unveiled proposals to lease seabed to encourage a new generation of offshore wind projects in Scottish waters.

Floaters have also been proposed off the southwest coast of England.

The authorities in Scotland seem to recognise the potential of floating wind even if their contemporaries in Westminster do not. Scottish energy minister Paul Wheelhouse told the conference the Kincardine demonstration project off the coast of Scotland “demonstrated the potential of floating offshore wind and Scotland’s potential role in it.” Scottish Renewables senior policy manager Fabrice Leveque said the announcement of first power from the Kincardine windfarm highlighted that Scotland “has a unique opportunity to reap the economic benefits of this emerging technology.”

Finding a route to market for floating wind was a major preoccupation for everyone at the event and opinion differed about the further value of demonstrators.

Some see them as an invaluable way to gain experience and show what technology can do, others doubted their usefulness as indicators of future cost levels.

There is a gap – described variously by speakers at the event as a ‘valley of death’ and a ‘chasm to be crossed’ – between demonstration projects and commercialscale projects the industry somehow needs to bridge. Some kind of innovation revenue mechanism is required, they suggest, that will reward innovation until floating wind can compete on cost terms with bottom-fixed projects. Despite these issues, said Green Giraffe director Clément Weber, floating wind projects are already bankable, and insurable, and there are a lot of projects in the precommercial and early development phases.

Mr Stiesdal also made the point that in his view there are already too many floating offshore wind concepts that are technically interesting but which fail the test of whether they could be standardised and manufactured in volume. The floating wind market will need a technically advantageous concept that can also be

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Paul Wheelhouse (Scottish energy minister): “the Kincardine project demonstrates the potential of floating offshore wind and Scotland’s role in it”

industrialised, he told delegates. “Because they cannot easily be industrialised,” he said, “some will inevitably fail the economic viability test.

“For deepwater floating windfarms the yardstick will not be costs compared with bottom-fixed offshore wind,” he said. “The yardstick against which floating wind will have to compete is solar PV and storage,” a sentiment that Sebastian Bringsgaerd, Hywind development director at Equinor, agreed with wholeheartedly.

Mr Stiesdal said when the floating offshore wind market takes off, the ability to industrialise concepts successfully will be a “super strong lever” and believes the TetraSpar concept his company, Stiesdal Offshore Technologies (SOT), is developing with oil company Shell, turbine manufacturer Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy and energy company innogy is just such a concept. The companies plan to undertake a demonstration project using the innovative floating foundation that uses a tubular steel main structure with a suspended keel that Mr Stiesdal believes will provide important competitive advantages over existing floating wind concepts, with the potential for leaner manufacturing, assembly and installation processes with lower material costs.

In the run up to the Aberdeen event, a flurry of reports was released, with WindEurope setting out steps it would like policymakers in Europe to implement in order to cement a lead in the floating wind sector. The wind energy trade body believes the right policy measures could permit large-

scale commercialisation of floating offshore wind. “As demonstrated this last decade with bottom-fixed offshore wind, speeding up the commercialisation process means driving down costs and contributing to European competitiveness,” said WindEurope. With the right visibility in terms of volumes and industrialisation, floating costs could tumble even faster than for bottom-fixed offshore wind, it believes, down from today’s €180200/MWh (US$207/MWh) to reach €40-60/ MWh by 2030.

WindEurope said European companies lead 75% of the 50-plus floating offshore wind projects currently in development across the globe. It sees floating offshore wind as a fast-maturing technology with huge potential but believes dedicated policies are needed to ensure Europe harnesses its full potential. “Floating offshore wind needs urgent action from the EU and member states to maximise the local economic benefits of a nascent supply chain. These should ensure that cost reduction continues through economies of scale, low financing costs and research and innovation,” WindEurope said. “Member states should set their ambitions for capacity, project pipelines and supporting policies for floating wind. The European Commission should publish the aggregated European volume of floating offshore wind projects to 2030 to enable a clear market visibility for investors and industry.”

A total of 55 innovations that could help reduce the levelised cost of energy from floating offshore wind have been identified in a report produced

by InnoEnergy and BVG Associates.

The joint report, Floating Offshore: 55 technology innovations that will have greater impact on reducing the cost of electricity from European floating offshore windfarms, is a companion to a previous report published by InnoEnergy in November 2017. InnoEnergy renewables technology officer Emilien Simonot said “We know that there is tremendous potential across the value chain for innovations to reduce the cost of floating offshore wind energy.”

A Crown Estate Scotland-commissioned study by the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult set out the potential benefits to the UK economy of floating wind development and the different types and costs of government support that may be needed. It is estimated up to 17,000 jobs and £33.6Bn (US$43Bn) of gross valueadded could be generated by 2050. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

28 | NOISE CONTROL

Low-noise pile driver can outperform noise mitigation systems Tests have demonstrated that an innovative water-driven piling unit developed for the offshore wind industry has multiple advantages compared with conventional technology and even outperforms hydraulic piling systems with noise mitigation measures, its developer claims

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fter a successful series of tests earlier this year, the Blue Hammer piling system developed by Fistuca in the Netherlands and tested in a joint project with The Carbon Trust’s Offshore Wind Accelerator is set to enter into commercial use in 2020.

Having successfully installed a test pile and then decommissioned it, the Blue Hammer pile-driving system needs only minor adjustments and will be ready to undertake its first projects late next year, the man behind the concept, Fistuca’s founder and managing director Jasper Winkes, told OWJ in an exclusive interview in early November.

The Offshore Wind Accelerator first announced details of what it described as “successful execution” of offshore tests by the innovative installation system, which reduces underwater noise and costs, in August 2018.

Describing the results in more detail, Mr Winkes told OWJ that the tests, conducted by The Carbon Trust and Fistuca in conjunction with industry partners Eon, EDPR, EnBW, Equinor, Ørsted, Shell, Sif, SSE, Van Oord and Vattenfall, were “very positive.”

The offshore tests of the BLUE 25M hammer as part of the Blue Pilot project were carried out on 13 August 2018 using Van Oord’s offshore heavy lift installation vessel, Svanen, off the coast of the Netherlands.

“The Blue Hammer proved it is 16-20 dB quieter than any hydraulic hammer and makes piling quieter than is possible with any noise mitigation system used in conjunction with a hydraulic hammer,” Mr Winkes told OWJ. “The remaining noise you get with the system is at a frequency which doesn’t adversely affect mammals or other marine life.

“We also proved the Blue Hammer can be used to drive monopiles with secondary steel structures attached to them. Now we plan to undertake a few modifications to the system, and test it again, in 2019, ready to make the system available to the market in 2020.

“The tests demonstrated what we expected, that we have a powerful business case in a number of respects. We are quieter than hydraulic hammers, quieter than noise mitigation systems, and when the pile is being driven using the Blue Hammer it suffers from less

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

Pile driving using conventional hydraulic hammers can adversely affect marine mammal and fish populations if mitigation measures are not in place

fatigue-related stress than it otherwise would.”

Fistuca’s strategy is to rent out the Blue Hammer on a projectby-project basis and build more examples of the innovative pile-driving system as demand picks up. “We also know that we can design hammers for specific projects, according to the size of monopiles, soil stiffness and water depth,” he explained.

As highlighted previously by OWJ, the Blue Hammer utilises water to provide a more energetic but quiet blow to drive a pile into the seabed. It was designed to reduce underwater noise levels significantly and reduce the fatigue damage while installing a pile.

As Mr Winkes stated, in many cases, this could not only remove the need for underwater noise mitigation but also enable secondary

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NOISE CONTROL | 29

The Blue Hammer is said to produce less noise than hydraulic hammers combined with noise mitigation

steel to be prewelded to the monopile before installation, potentially unlocking ‘transition piece free’ designs. By reducing the time piling takes and the number of operations carried out offshore, the innovative piling method could also improve health and safety and significantly reduce costs.

The offshore tests provided significant insights and understanding for future commercial operations. Data was recorded on both acceleration levels on the monopile and underwater noise levels in the surrounding area which have now been analysed and interpreted to validate studies undertaken prior to the test.

Impacts on fish from piling

Much of the attention on noise reduction from piling has focused on potential adverse effects on mammals, but attention has also turned to the possible impact on fish from piling at offshore wind sites.

Now, a revised technique for mapping the spawning sites of Atlantic herring in the UK has been developed, which will ensure fish are protected during offshore windfarm construction and which could lead to a more efficient and low-cost development process.

It was described in a report produced by The Carbon Trust for the Offshore Renewables Joint Industry Programme (ORJIP).

The potential impact of noise from pile-driving activity has led to restrictions and conditions placed on UK offshore renewables developers during construction activity when marine mammals and fish are considered to be most vulnerable to disturbance, such as during spawning and migration. It is important to ensure the established controls are appropriately formulated to deliver a protection benefit without unnecessarily burdening development.

The Impacts on Fish from Piling at Offshore Wind Sites project analysed annual fish spawning data in UK waters over the past 10 years to better define fish spawning grounds and to evaluate the

potential impacts of new offshore wind sites on Atlantic herring and other fish.

The main spawning sites for Atlantic herring stocks in UK waters are well known. However, due to the specific habitat and environmental conditions that herring need to spawn successfully, there are discrete pockets of spawning bed areas that are less easy to identify as they can change from year to year.

Currently the exact location of spawning beds can only be identified if they are recorded through grab sampling or by drop-down video surveys. This study aims to address the uncertainty of the accuracy of fish spawning information and the impacts of piling activity on fish species.

The objectives of the study were to review and consolidate available data and information to define (where possible) UK populations, spawning areas, and periods for key species of concern; identify any gaps in understanding of fish populations, spawning areas and periods; define and gain acceptance with consenting authorities and experts on fish populations, spawning areas and periods; and discuss and understand how the current mitigation approaches are agreed by consenting authorities with the aim of understanding what is required to support a change in construction restrictions.

The study that forms the basis of the report was launched in 2017 and is the first ORJIP study to look in detail at the important subject of fish and windfarm consenting. The analysis shifts the focus of studies from abandoned spawning sites and highlights those regions that have shown recent spawning activity. The techniques and methodology of heat mapping demonstrated the final report study provides clearer information of the areas of spawning and their proximity to offshore wind developments.

If considered in the consenting process this could lead to a reduction in construction times, potentially lowering cost to consumers, and reducing operational disruption for offshore windfarms.

Consortium to commercialise low-noise foundation An industry consortium has been awarded â‚Ź3.8M (US$4.4M) by the Energy Technology Development and Demonstration Programme to demonstrate the advantages of industrialising an enhanced suction bucket foundation for offshore windfarms.

The partners in the project said the

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overall aim of the project is to mature the industrialised suction bucket concept towards commercial-scale applications.

The consortium includes Siemens Gamesa, Universal Foundation, Aalborg University, Fred Olsen Windcarrier and Offshoreenergy.dk. The funds were

awarded via the Danish Ministry of Energy, Utilities and Climate.

The concept merges the noise-free installation advantages of suction buckets with industrialised fabrication techniques using coil steel instead of conventional plate steel. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

30 | OPERATIONS & MAINTENANCE

Industry innovators fast-track new O&M concepts A leading manufacturer of offshore wind turbines is collaborating with experts in Denmark’s Fast Track project to find solutions to leading edge erosion and wants to develop a new standard for blade protection to benefit the whole industry

An example of an alternative access and working-at-height solution developed by Span Access Ltd

T

he offshore wind industry is developing rapidly and expanding worldwide. One of the keys to its success is the development of larger and more powerful offshore turbines. 8-10 MW turbines are becoming the norm, but much larger units are in development. With the development of larger and larger turbines comes the need for longer and longer rotor blades.

However, there is an issue with which the industry has long wrestled, one that has affected blades since the early days of the industry, when blades were much shorter. Harsh weather conditions lead to a phenomenon known as leading edge erosion.

Blade leading edge erosion is a problem onshore and offshore but erosion is accelerated offshore due to environmental conditions. It affects the aerodynamic performance of the blade, which leads to reduced efficiency, reliability and availability, as well as increased operations and maintenance activity.

Blade leading edge erosion also reduces the generating capacity of a wind turbine and hence of a windfarm as a whole.

If severe, it can also affect a blade’s structural integrity as water ingress and UV light exposure can lead to structural damage. All of this proves costly for offshore windfarm owner/operators through lost power generation and revenue.

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

Fast Track project

To address the issue and try to find potential solutions, Siemens Gamesa’s surface treatment and corrosion team has joined several industry experts in the Fast Track project – an initiative supported

by Innovation Fund Denmark – to improve materials and protective coatings, and thus reduce maintenance costs and extend the lifetime of wind turbine blades.

The Fast Track partnership provides services to the materials engineering sector and was set up to meet the needs of Danish industry. The aim is to put the right people together across fields to give them access to materials engineering solutions, to simplify the process of solving materials engineering problems and make that process more efficient.

In response to the challenge, Fast Track brought together a number of organisations active in the sector, including Siemens Gamesa, Hempel, Terma, Elplatek, FORCE Technology and DTU, Aalborg University, and Teknologisk Institut.

As Kasper Bondo Hansen, who heads up the Fast Track initiative explained, longer blades have a higher tip speed. It can exceed 350 km/h. Strong offshore winds accelerate water drops and particles that meet the leading edge of the wind turbine blade at extremely high speed.

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sub RUNNING HEAD | 31

Leading edge erosion can affect a blade’s structural integrity and lead to lost power generation and revenue

“This regular mechanical impact on the leading edge of the blade results in severe material degradation over time,” he said.

Harsh weather conditions also lead to erosion of surface coatings, which reduces the turbine’s annual energy production. “Erosion is one of the most critical degradation mechanisms occurring on wind turbine blades, as it requires non-operational downtime due to costly on-site repair work,” he explained.

Despite the deficiencies of existing coatings, they remain among the most important ways to protect a blade from erosion. Existing solutions consist of glass fibre reinforced epoxy protected by a paint system, but this kind of protection can degrade rapidly – in two to seven years of the turbine’s operation – depending on conditions. Hence, the offshore wind energy industry is looking for new ideas to improve leading edge protection, ideas that can withstand physical impact and protect the blade coating in the long run.

The Fast Track project kicked off in 2016 and is due to be completed in mid-2019. Various technologies are being addressed in materials research projects and sub-projects, and Mr Bondo Hansen believes that improvements are on the way.

The leading edge protection effort is one of the subprojects. Its aim is to investigate material properties and erosion mechanisms using innovative techniques that combine analysis of failure modes with real-life experience, accelerated testing and lifetime modelling.

“In this particular project we want to free ourselves from conventional thinking and be open to innovative ideas. New thinking about materials and processing will enable us to set new standards and, if possible, redefine the concept of leading edge protection,” he explained.

“Promoting a competitive process environment across the industry will help us to provide a stepping stone for future innovation, something that Siemens Gamesa will lead,” he said.

“Doing so will enable the industry to develop new-generation blades that will have inherently better properties.”

Ane Saelland Christiansen, a specialist engineer at Siemens Gamesa, said the company’s surface treatment and corrosion department is part of a team developing a new standard for corrosion protection for offshore wind turbines. “Hopefully, the deliverables from Fast Track will be incorporated into new product coating processes.

“We would also like to establish standardisation and certification for more suitable product and process specifications, new methods of assessing adhesion strength, and establish a long-term solution to leading edge erosion,” she concluded.

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Offshore blade access

However good future leading edge protection systems are, access to rotor blades offshore will continue to be required. But it is a timeconsuming and expensive business. However, a Scottish company, Span Access Solutions Ltd, is developing an innovative way to access the blades that could save £1.05Bn (US$1.37Bn) across the current European fleet of offshore windfarms.

The £830,000 Innovate UK-backed project Blade Access System and Working Environment (BASE) project aims to develop a tower-mounted blade access system and habitat to provide a stable working environment for technicians undertaking blade maintenance. Such a concept could reduce maintenance costs and minimise turbine downtime and lost revenue while increasing the quality of repairs and performance upgrades, it is claimed.

Span Access, based in Kinross and Methil, is a specialist in alternative access and working-at-height solutions and will work in partnership with the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult, Turner Access Ltd, Turner Iceni, along with Dundee and Robert Gordon universities to adapt their patented product suite to a solution for offshore wind.

The Span Access product is a purpose built, modular access platform technology for working at height and its flexible, adaptable systems can be designed to accommodate improved access to any challenging blade design. The BASE project aims to create an optimised prototype access solution for offshore windfarms, which will be demonstrated at ORE Catapult’s 7-MW Levenmouth Demonstration Turbine in Fife.

The repair of blade damage and/or installation of performance upgrades is typically undertaken using rope access technicians and access platforms suspended from the turbine nacelle. The length of turbine downtime, and hence lost energy production, using this approach is high and the quality of repairs are often difficult to manage in highly variable weather and working conditions.

Span Access managing director Ross Turner said the BASE solution will be faster to deploy and more flexible to use than traditional suspended platforms. This should mean that revenue lost from forced turbine shutdowns associated with blade maintenance will be substantially reduced. “We’ll be able to control the temperature and humidity within the habitat, increasing the weather windows for performing maintenance and improving the quality of complex repairs that require stable environmental conditions for curing materials,” he explained. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

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OFFSHORE ACCESS | 33

Lifting systems seek access to crowded personnel transfer market Well established in the offshore oil and gas and offshore wind industries, motioncompensated gangways could soon be complemented by lifting platforms for personnel and cargo

The Eagle Access system is a lifting platform for up to four people or 1 tonne of cargo

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agle Access, a Dutch company formed by two individuals with lengthy experience in the marine and offshore sectors and in offshore access systems, has begun building a prototype of a new concept that lifts personnel and equipment into place from the deck of a vessel.

Sea trials are due to get under way in September 2019.

The company was established by Willem Prins and Marco Klitsie in 2016. Both men have significant experience developing and constructing systems and were involved in developing a number of first-generation access systems.

Analysing the offshore access market, the founders of Eagle Access found existing gangways “only partly meet the demands of clients” and in many cases “failed to reduce operating costs or enhance workability, particularly as regards cargo.”

Mr Prins and Mr Klitsie decided to go back to basics and start from scratch with a new approach that is not a gangway. They

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wanted to reduce the cost of transfers and avoid downtime due to inclement weather. They believe the Eagle Access system provides a solution that can quickly switch between cargo and personnel transfer, transferring up to four people or 1-tonne loads at a time.

Mr Prins and Mr Klitsie wanted to ensure the system had as high a level of operability as possible and is only limited by the dynamic positioning capability of the vessel on which it is installed. The requirements of the system include a dynamic positioning class 2 vessel, 4-m2 deck space, 75 kW of electrical power and a crane driver.

They also wanted to ensure it was easy to operate with significant reach while being smaller and lighter than existing systems. Taken together, they felt these features would reduce the time it takes to undertake a transfer and enable as many transfers as possible in a day. They felt it was also important the system should be able to transfer personnel and equipment to unprepared platforms.

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

34 | OFFSHORE ACCESS

Unlike most offshore access systems, the Eagle Access system is 100% electrically powered, making hydraulic power packs and generators unnecessary. Construction costs are lower as a result, as are operating costs, which the company said are “significantly reduced.”

Another advantage of the Eagle Access system is it has a small footprint on the deck of the vessel, making it possible to use smaller vessels such as platform supply vessels, they said.

Other advantages are the range of the system – from sea level to a height of 25 m – and its low weight (17 tonnes).

The resulting system has a closed cabin for windfarm technicians and provides the same reach to either side of the vessel. Cameras at the tip of the arm closely monitor the approach and landing from different angles. All vessel motions are fully motion-compensated. Once landed on the turbine or platform the crew step out of the cabin and the system can take off. The patented, uncomplicated design of the system only requires three drives. The system is also DNV GL-compliant.

With a similar concept of operation, Lift2Work’s OPTS offshore access system has approval to the DNV GL-ST-0378 standard.

The company said it now plans to obtain ST-358 Certification of offshore gangways for personnel transfer survey. Like the Eagle Access system, the OPTS is not a gangway but is a fully motioncompensated lifting platform. It was designed to provide access to offshore oil and gas platforms, offshore wind structures, other vessels and structures. It can move freely through 360° and has a reach of 24 m horizontally and more than 20 m vertically above deck level. It can also drop to 6 m below the level of the deck, for example, for rescue purposes.

Among the latest systems delivered by UK-based OSBIT is a gangway for GeoSea, delivered earlier in 2018. With jack-up vessels being moored farther away from fixed structures, GeoSea needed a system that could safely bridge greater distances, which can vary in length between vessel and landing location.

Motion-compensated gangways are widely used in the offshore oil and gas and offshore wind sectors

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

OSBIT designed and built a telescoping gangway that can be installed on any jack-up vessel. The system is certified to DNV GL ST0358 and has a telescoping length of 20-32 m. It has loading capacity for three people and minimum/maximum luffing angles of -30° to +30°. It has a rotation angle of 330° for flexible positioning. Stair treads facilitate safe access when the gangway is inclined.

September 2018 saw Safeway in Dordrecht, the Netherlands, introduced its third motion-compensated walkway, the Safeway Albatross. Safeway already has two active motion-compensated walk-to-work systems on the market, Safeway Seagull and the recently added Safeway Osprey. The main aim of the new Albatross design is to offer increased flexibility to shipowners and operators.

The most important feature of the Safeway Albatross is that a lift is integrated into the mast to transport goods, pallets and people.

As an option, the lift can be extended to the below-deck storage level. The boom of the Safeway Albatross can be rotated through 360°, allowing the mast to be mounted centrally on the deck of a vessel. It also means the 30-m gangway can be oriented towards the stern, port or starboard, to safely transfer workers and their equipment. Safeway also announced it can supply an optional variant with a boom length of up to 32 m. This gangway can be mounted on vessels with a breadth of 24 m.

Among the latest contracts awarded to Ampelmann are deals for five systems for use in the offshore wind sector in the North Sea. The projects will see two A-type and three E-type systems installed on vessels operating in the North Sea. Among the new contracts is a five-month commissioning campaign with vessel owner Eidesvik. An Ampelmann E-type system was installed on Viking Neptun to enable support work at the Merkur offshore windfarm in the German North Sea. The E-type provides safe offshore access in rough sea waters and can compensate wave motions up to 4.5 m Hs. Another well-known player in the market, the Netherlandsbased SMST, is due to deliver an access and cargo tower and a 3D motion-compensated crane for Bibby Marine Services’ newbuild service operation vessel (SOV) in Q2 2019. The SMST equipment will be used to safely transfer maintenance personnel and cargo from the Damen-built SOV to offshore wind turbines. The vessel, a sister ship to Bibby WaveMaster 1, is due to work for EnBW and Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy on the Hohe See and Albatros offshore windfarms. It has been chartered for 10 years.

The package of equipment ordered for the vessel includes a 3D crane, elevator and motion-compensated gangway. The access and cargo tower will enable safe and stepless transfer, up to a significant wave height of 3.5 m. The landing height of the access and cargo tower can be adjusted to provide access to platforms up to 26 m above sea level.

Bernhard Schulte’s new SOV will have a motioncompensated gangway and adjustable pedestal from Uptime in Norway. The Norwegian company has entered into a contract with Ulstein Verft for delivery of an Uptime 30-m offshore access solution. Ulstein Verft will integrate the gangway into a service operation vessel developed by Ulstein Design & Solutions. The vessel is due to be delivered in 2020. The contract consists of an active motion-compensated gangway and an adjustable pedestal which will be mounted adjacent to an elevator tower in the Ulstein SX 195 SOV. The Bernhard Schulte vessel will support maintenance work by GE Renewable Energy on the Merkur offshore windfarm. OWJ

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Move Forward with Confidence

36 | PROJECT FOCUS

innogy aiming for 50% UK content UK content has long been an issue in offshore windfarms but at least half of the value of one of the largest projects now being implemented should fall to UK companies

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t the end of August 2018, innogy confirmed it has completed financing for the Triton Knoll offshore windfarm in the UK, that MHI Vestas is to provide the turbines, Able Seaton Port will lead turbine construction and Grimsby is the target for a long-term operations base.

In a statement, innogy said all debt required for the project has been committed by the project lenders, an investment that amounts

Julian Garnsey: “Triton Knoll expects to deliver at least 50% of its investment with UK firms over the project’s lifecycle”

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

to approximately £2.0Bn (US$2.6Bn). The project got underway in September when work started on constructing the onshore electrical system.

The required investment will be provided by international commercial lenders including a consortium of 15 banks that are providing around £1.751Bn of debt facilities, securing the realisation of the 860-MW offshore windfarm, located 20 miles off the coast of Lincolnshire. innogy chief operating office renewables Hans Bünting said, “By reaching financial close we have created the financial foundation for realising Triton Knoll jointly with our new equity partners and international lenders.”

A 15-year power purchase agreement (PPA) has also been agreed with Ørsted, under which the company will offtake 100% of the power produced by Triton Knoll windfarm. The PPA complements Triton Knoll’s contracts for difference, mitigating any market price uncertainty for the first 15 years of the windfarm’s operation. Both parties to the deal have agreed to maintain confidentiality regarding the terms of the PPA. In mid-August, innogy confirmed two new partners with whom it will take Triton Knoll forward, in line with the company’s strategy of growing its renewables portfolio through partnerships. J-Power will take a 25% share, and Kansai Electric Power a 16% share, while innogy retains the majority equity stake of 59% and will manage the construction, operation and maintenance works on behalf of the project partners.

Triton Knoll has placed orders with MHI Vestas Offshore Wind to provide the project with 90 of its V164-9.5 MW turbines. The company will establish a full-scale turbine pre-assembly operation at Able UK’s Seaton Port in Teesside, from enabling works to loadout.

It is anticipated that the port activity involving all partners could create around 100 new, predominately local jobs and unlock over £16M investment in new infrastructure and equipment.

Triton Knoll has also agreed a memorandum of understanding with ABP to use its Grimsby facility as the windfarm’s long-term operations and maintenance (O&M) base. Studies estimate the O&M work has the potential to support up to 170 direct and indirect long-term jobs.

Triton Knoll project director Julian Garnsey said “This is a great moment for Triton Knoll and the UK offshore wind industry as we formally secure the means to deliver around £2Bn of new UK energy infrastructure. Triton Knoll expects to deliver at least 50% of our investment with UK firms over the project’s lifecycle and at the height of construction we expect to see over 3,000 people working on the project.

“We are delighted to be expanding the project’s UK footprint with MHI Vestas and these two east coast ports. The subsequent investment in Able UK’s Seaton port facility represents a great opportunity to enhance offshore wind port facilities within the Northern Powerhouse region.”

Able UK will develop an additional 140 m of new heavy-duty quayside at the port and invest in equipment and facilities to support delivery of Triton Knoll. It said the investment will help the port

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PROJECT FOCUS | 37

on 860-MW North Sea windfarm Hans Bünting: “innogy created the financial foundation for Triton Knoll jointly with equity partners and international lenders”

become a competitive force within the offshore sector and provide considerable opportunities for the local supply chain.

Able UK’s executive chairman Peter Stephenson said, “We have enjoyed a long and constructive relationship with Triton Knoll. It is a massive vote of confidence in the UK, us and the Teesside supply chain. Our sustained investment means we can provide a bespoke and tailor-made solution for Triton Knoll.

“This contract effectively completes Able’s offshore wind CV and is very much the start of something that will continue to grow.

Government policy supports further growth in the offshore wind sector, with some of that potential on our doorstep, such as innogy’s Sofia project. However, we do not take things for granted and our first and most important task is to ensure the successful and efficient execution of this exciting project.”

SeawayHeavy Lifting was awarded a contract to transport and install 90 foundations and two offshore substations. Offshore installation activity will be executed in 2020 using Seaway Heavy Lifting’s crane vessel, Stanislav Yudin. GeoSea, DEME’s offshore marine engineering specialist, has been awarded a contract to transport and install the turbines.

Royal Boskalis Westminster has been awarded a contract for suppling and installing the export and inter-array cables for Triton Knoll, having signed a preferred supplier agreement in September 2017. The scope includes two 50-km export cables and 97 66-kV inter-array cables which will be installed with two cable-laying vessels owned by the company. The project will be executed by Boskalis Subsea Cables & Flexibles in consortium with NKT, and is due to be carried out in 2020.

As highlighted above, onshore construction got under way in September in Lincolnshire with work on the electrical system to transmit power from the windfarm. The official ‘breaking-ofground’ took place directly on the route of the new high-voltage underground export cable, located at the main onshore cable site offices off the A16 near Stickney. UK firms J Murphy & Sons Ltd

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and Siemens Transmission and Distribution Ltd (STDL) have been contracted to carry out this part of the project. Mr Garnsey said innogy was committed to supporting local and regional jobs and skills development.

Onshore construction presents some significant engineering challenges as innogy and its contractors install more than 57 km of underground electrical export cable below ground. The route starts at the landfall location north of Anderby Creek, where the onshore and offshore cables connect. It runs to a new substation being constructed near Bicker, and then to the existing National Grid Bicker Fen substation where the electricity from the offshore windfarm will ultimately connect into the grid. More than 300 individual directional drills – a record for a UK infrastructure project – will ensure the onshore cables can be installed without obstructing any roads, highways, rivers or drains.

Murphy chief executive John Murphy said, “The cable route presents an exciting engineering challenge for us and we’ve worked diligently and intelligently to create better engineered solutions that will allow us deliver it with minimum disruption.”

Work on the onshore substation will start early in 2019, with Siemens constructing a new facility close to the existing electrical substation near Bicker. Work is already underway to construct a new ‘bellmouth’ entry point and 3.8-km access road to the new substation construction site to ensure construction traffic can avoid using smaller local roads. STDL project director Phil Manley said the main offshore work will begin in 2019.

Triton Knoll has committed to delivering at least 50% UK content through the construction and operation of the windfarm, and onshore construction presents one of the most significant opportunities for local firms to benefit from the project’s investment.

Murphy and STDL have already engaged local companies in preparation for the construction start and are seeking local and regional companies to further support their work. innogy said the horizontal directional drilling programme was due to get underway in Q4 2018, with onshore cable installation from Q2 2019. Offshore horizontal directional drilling is due to take place from March to May 2019, with the cable route work completed

by Q3 2020. The onshore substation construction is due to get under way in February 2019, with commissioning work in 2020. First generation from the offshore windfarm is expected in 2021. OWJ £2Bn is being invested in innogy’s 860-MW Triton Knoll offshore wind project

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

38 | TRAINING & RECRUITMENT

Fast growth in offshore wind means tens of thousands will need to be recruited A newly published study suggests that by 2032, the UK will need 36,000 people employed in the offshore wind sector, triple the number currently working in it. Where will they come from?

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he UK leads the world in developing and constructing offshore windfarms. Significant further growth in the sector is anticipated, but where will the people come from who will design, construct and maintain all of the offshore windfarms the UK expects to build in the next decade?

Some of the answers to that question are provided by Aura (an initiative at the University of Hull on the northeast coast of the UK) and its partners, who launched a report, Skills and Labour Requirements of the UK Offshore Wind Industry 2018 to 2032, in October, a national study with a focus on the Humber region.

The study, funded by the Regional Growth Fund Green Port Growth Programme and carried out by Energy & Utility Skills, is based on a review of existing and new quantitative data, as well as a qualitative input from leading offshore wind organisations. It sets out the extent of the workforce supply and demand requirements over the next 15 years.

It takes as its start point the fact that the offshore wind industry is growing rapidly and is on its way to becoming a mainstream provider of low-carbon electricity for the country, helping to ensure the UK meets its climate change targets. But to deliver on the ambitions the industry has set itself, it is going to need many more skilled people to join its workforce.

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

Based on government and industry estimates that installed offshore wind capacity in the UK could be 35 GW, or five times its existing level by 2032, the study’s main findings include that the requirement for workers is set to increase from 10,000 today to 36,000 by 2032; that the sector will be operating in a very tight labour market over the coming years and there will be fierce competition for talent; and that skills shortages could become more prevalent and the industry is going to need a wide range of skills sets – from asset management, leadership, engineering and scientists through to the softer skills such as team working and problem solving.

The report also found that the industry needs to work with the educational system now to ensure the right skills and talents come through the system at all levels over the coming years – from schools and apprenticeships to higher education and continual professional development for those already well along in their careers; and many of the job opportunities will be focused on the east coast of the UK where the windfarms are located.

Commenting on the publication of the findings, the Aura talent and skills lead John Weir said, “The publication of this skills study today is very timely and sets out the exciting career opportunities the offshore wind industry presents for those interested in working for the renewable energy

industry, whether for those of us already well established in our careers or those just considering where to invest their talents and recently acquired qualifications."

Energy & Utility Skills workforce planning consultant Rob Murphy, the author of the report, said it was clear from the data analysis and interviews with industry experts that the offshore wind industry has great potential to be both a substantial provider of low carbon energy and a significant regional employer – but there are many challenges to overcome to ensure there is a sufficiently

Hugh McNeal: “tens of thousands of new jobs will be created as offshore wind becomes the backbone of a clean, reliable and affordable energy system”

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The offshore wind industry needs to recruit large numbers of men and women, and wants to become a leader for diversity and inclusion

resilient workforce. “This report sets out the challenges and makes recommendations to address them,” he said. “If the true potential of the offshore wind industry is to be unlocked, a more co-ordinated approach is needed – one that brings together businesses from across the supply chain, skills providers at all levels, regional and national government and the full range of support agencies.”

Writing in the foreword to the report, RenewableUK chief executive Hugh McNeal said “As an industry, we have set ourselves some very ambitious targets which we have set out in the offshore wind Sector Deal prospectus. Tens of thousands of new jobs will be created as offshore wind becomes the backbone of a clean, reliable and affordable energy system.

The UK is leading the world in offshore wind, with more installed capacity than any other country. We need to retain this position by continuing our investment in innovation and we can only do that with inspired and creative people.”

He highlighted that fast growth in the offshore wind industry will mean the sector is going to have to compete against others to attract talented people. He said too few school leavers are choosing the subjects needed to work in an industry driven by technology, such as offshore wind. He noted that the UK is already short of approximately 20,000 engineering graduates per year. “We need to change

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“We must ensure that the talent pipeline, which starts with 14-yearolds at school now, is able to provide the sector with the skilled workforce we are going to need over the next decade or so”

that,” said Mr McNeal.

He also noted that the offshore wind industry wants to become a leading industry for diversity and inclusion. “We want to be the industry of choice for women and black, Asian and minority ethnic workers who want a career in a science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) sector,” he explained.

“We will be proactive in ensuring more females progress their studies of STEM subjects post-16. Only 35% of post-16 females study STEM subjects such as maths, physics, computing or a technical vocational qualification (compared with 94% of post-16 males). This is despite females accounting for 50% of STEM students at GCSE level.”

Mr McNeal said the study demonstrated the importance of delivering a sector-wide strategy to standardise education and skills

training to support clear career pathways and qualifications for all levels across the industry. “Education provision is fragmented and unco-ordinated in the UK today,” he said. “We want to make it easier for people to work within the industry and supply chain, and to transfer from other industries and professions.

“We are still a young and pioneering sector and we need to build on that to ensure we keep our dominant position in the world. We need a highly skilled, diverse and motivated workforce to deliver innovative technologies that drive decarbonisation across the economy in the coming decades.”

According to Aura, 265,000 skilled entrants are needed each year to meet the demands from engineering companies through to 2024. It is predicted there could be a shortfall of 20,000 engineering graduates per year across the UK. Significant shifts are predicted to occur over the coming years (such as those caused by Brexit and new technology) and these will need to be recognised and adapted to by businesses. In 2015, 36% of vacancies in the energy sector were classified as skills shortages, the highest proportion in any sector, and it is unlikely this situation will ease given the high level of investment planned for the UK infrastructure sector and the continued demand for skilled labour. OWJ

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

40 | SERVICE OPERATION VESSELS

Innovative SOV enters the water as more vessels are ordered A Turkish yard with a track record of building service operation vessels for the offshore wind energy industry has launched the latest innovative example as new vessels are ordered and designs begin to be developed for the US market

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he latest in a growing number of service operation vessels (SOVs) that have been delivered or are on order, Wind of Change is being built at Cemre in Turkey for Louis Dreyfus Armateurs (LDA) and, when completed, will enter into a long-term contract with offshore wind energy leader Ørsted.

Delivery of Wind of Change is expected early in 2019. It will be operated on the Borkum Riffgrund 1 and 2 and Gode Wind 1 and 2 offshore windfarms in Germany, providing a maintenance base for technicians to service wind turbines. The vessel has accommodation for 90, including more than 60 windfarm technicians.

Wind of Change is an innovative vessel in a number of respects, not least its motion-compensated TTS Colibri crane and OnBoard DC grid

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

The 83.0-m vessel has a beam of 19.4 m and will be equipped with a dynamic motion-compensated gangway with what naval architect Salt Ship Design described as “a unique onboard logistic solution”.

LDA worked closely with Salt Ship Design to develop a vessel tailored for the needs of the offshore wind industry. “This has resulted in a very purpose-driven SOV,” said the Norwegian naval architect.

Windfarm technicians will be transferred to turbines via a specially designed daughter craft (in good weather conditions) and will use the motion-compensated gangway in heavy seas.

The daughter craft will be capable of transferring eight windfarm technicians and 1 tonne of cargo to a turbine. The motioncompensated gangway will have a range of approximately 19 m and will be complemented by a unique motion-compensated crane with a lifting capacity of 1 tonne at 23 m.

The windfarm service vessel will have a DC power distribution system in the form of ABB’s OnBoard DC grid, allowing batteries to be integrated into it, making the ship more environmentally friendly and efficient. ABB is installing the DC grid along with a power and energy management system enabling the generators to run at variable speeds while also charging the batteries.

In a statement about the system, ABB marine and ports global product manager for Onboard DC Grid John Olav Lindtjørn, said “Energy storage can be used for many purposes on board. Sometimes it will serve as the sole energy source, but for this windfarm vessel it is being used as an effective supporting element for the main engines.”

The DC grid will integrate two sets of batteries that will be used primarily as a ‘spinning reserve’ and for peak shaving so that power peaks during operation can be covered by the battery rather than starting another engine. Battery power can also act as backup for running generators, reducing the need to run spare generator capacity.

The level of operating efficiency available in a hybrid power system reduces wear and tear on engines and significantly increases fuel efficiency at lower loads where, in conventional AC power systems, generators run at a fixed maximum speed regardless of the power demand on board. Apart from enhancing the ship’s green credentials in the environmentally conscious offshore wind industry,

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sub RUNNING HEAD | 41

Bernhard Schulte’s new SOV will have a motion-compensated gangway and adjustable pedestal from Uptime in Norway

ABB also points to a benefit for the vessel’s crew: reduced vibration when the hybrid system is on battery power.

MAN is supplying the 8L21/31 variable-speed engines for the gensets for the vessel, which will also feature the company's EPROX energy-saving electric propulsion system, further reducing the vessel’s fuel consumption and emissions. The engines will be prepared for IMO Tier III and set up so they can be retrofitted at a later date with an SCR system. This is to cater for the possibility that IMO Tier III NOx emission limits could be introduced, without obligation, in NOx emission-control areas in the North Sea and Baltic. ABB has overall responsibility for the electric propulsion system.

Uptime in Norway was contracted to supply the walk-to-work gangway for the newbuild. TTS Group and Ulstein provided the motioncompensated crane. Together, the companies were awarded a contract for what will be the first TTS Colibri motion-compensated crane. The new crane combines TTS’s expertise in crane design and manufacturing with Ulstein’s expertise in motion technology and analysis. “Two features make the TTS Colibri unique compared to other solutions in the market,” claimed Ulstein Equipment managing director Gilbert Rezette. “Firstly, the Colibri system is a stand-alone add-on device for a standard offshore crane. It adds functionality, while the crane maintains its functionality as a full-fledged offshore crane including deepwater subsea capabilities. However, what makes this system truly unique is its groundbreaking anti-sway technology, which also allows it to mitigate wind-induced motions that act directly on the load.

“3D motion-compensation technology is not new to the industry and has enabled greater operability for personnel transfer between vessels and fixed offshore platforms through the use of motioncompensated gangways,” he said. “However, operations typically require personnel and equipment to be transferred between a vessel and platform. Hence, TTS Colibri is a natural step in enhanced vessel operability, providing motion-compensated lifting to match the increased operability offered by motion-compensated gangways.”

In April 2018, Ørsted placed a contract with the Turkish yards for a second SOV, to be delivered in 2021, for the Hornsea Project 2 offshore windfarm. A sister vessel to Wind of Change, which was ordered in 2017, the second ship was also designed in close cooperation with Salt Ship Design. Like the first vessel it will have the innovative hybrid propulsion system using diesel generators and ABB’s OnBoard DC grid and incorporate an energy storage system using batteries.

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More recently, MHI Vestas placed a contract with Danish shipowner Esvagt for two newbuild SOVs for the Borssele III-IV and Triton Knoll offshore windfarms, a deal that also includes an option for an additional vessel for the Moray East offshore windfarm.

The contracts for the new vessels will run for up to 15 years and reinforces the strong relationship between Esvagt and MHI Vestas, who have collaborated since 2010. The Danish owner said the longterm nature of the contracts will also play a key role in minimising costs and ensuring an efficient operation. The two new vessels will be of Havyard 831L design.

MHI Vestas chief operating officer Flemming Ougaard said the deal builds on “many years of strong, innovative collaboration with Esvagt.” Esvagt and MHI Vestas have co-operated on windfarm service ships for eight years, notably on the Belwind 1 and Nobelwind 1 offshore windfarms in Belgium. In 2017, the newly built SOV Esvagt Mercator began servicing the two windfarms.

Esvagt has five SOVs and a sixth in production. With the two new vessels, it will have eight custom-designed SOVs. The shipowner’s newly appointed CEO, Peter Lytzen, said this emphasises Esvagt’s ambition in the offshore wind market. Esvagt previously worked with Havyard on the SOVs Esvagt Froude, Esvagt Faraday, Esvagt Njord and Esvagt Mercator.

The Havyard 831L will be 70.5 m long with accommodation for up to 60 people. The vessel is designed for maximum fuel efficiency and will be equipped with a compensated walk-to-work gangway and Esvagt’s specially designed daughter craft. The new vessels will be delivered to Esvagt in Q3 2020 and Q1 2021.

Another new service operation vessel, built at Gondan shipyard in Spain for Norwegian shipowner Østensjø Rederi, started sea trials in August 2018 and arrived in Grimsby in the UK prior to entering service in September. The SOV, Edda Mistral, will work for Ørsted on the Race Bank and Hornsea Project One offshore windfarms off the coast of the UK. Edda Mistral is a sister vessel to the recently delivered Edda Passat. Both have a length of approximately 81 m and a 17 m beam. They have capacity to accommodate up to 40 offshore wind technicians who will perform maintenance tasks on the windfarms.

They have a crew of 20.

Both vessels are equipped with an Uptime 23-m heavecompensated walk-to-work gangway, a 3D motion-compensated crane and a crew transfer vessel (CTV) landing system with a

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

42 | SERVICE OPERATION VESSELS

bunkering facility for CTVs. In addition to the gangway, the vessels have a helideck and an 11-m daughter craft to safely transfer technicians to turbines.

Windea Offshore, the joint venture between German shipowner Bernhard Schulte, BUSS Offshore, EMS Maritime Offshore and SSC Wind has ordered a newbuild service operation vessel to support turbine maintenance by GE Renewable Energy. The vessel has been ordered from Ulstein Verft in Norway, which designed and built two vessels operated by Windea. The new unit is somewhat larger than the earlier two, Windea la Cour and Windea Leibnitz. Bernhard Schulte Offshore signed a contract with GE Renewable Energy to provide the newbuild SOV to support maintenance of the 66 Haliade 150-6MW turbines on the Merkur offshore windfarm in Germany.

The SX195 design has been modified to fulfil GE Renewable Energy’s requirements and the owner’s choice of mission equipment.

It has a large, centrally positioned walk-to-work, motioncompensated gangway and elevator tower for personnel and cargo transfers. It will also have a 3D motion-compensated crane capable of lifting 2 tonnes. The onboard logistics concept includes a large storage capacity of which half will be underdeck in a controlled environment, and a stepless approach to offshore installations. The vessel will be equipped with a fuel-efficient hybrid drive system including batteries. Like the earlier vessels the company ordered from Ulstein, the new SOV will have the Ulstein X-STERN and X-BOW hullform. This will enable it to be positioned stern towards the weather, leading to improved seakeeping, greater operability and reduced power and fuel consumption while in dynamic positioning mode. The vessel will be 93.4 m long with a breadth of 18 m and will have accommodation for 120 people.

The earlier vessels were 88 m in length with a breadth of 18 m and accommodation for 60 people.

US outfit turns to Ulstein for Jones Act service operation vessel Aeolus Energy in the US announced in October 2018 that it had signed an agreement with Ulstein Design & Solutions to design a service operation vessel (SOV).

When constructed, the vessel will be Jones Act-compliant and will serve as an initial Aeolus investment in a fleet of vessels including cable ships, crew transfer vessels and hotel ships, all designed to service the offshore wind industry from installation through to decommissioning.

Aeolus is committing to construct each of its vessels at US shipyards.

The Aeolus fleet will be fully Jones Act-compliant, ultimately consisting of vessels spanning the full range of offshore windfarm requirements.

Currently such a fleet does not exist in the US. Aeolus Energy Inc chief executive Elia Golfin said, “The design and ultimate construction of these vessels will result in significant job creation and

is a demonstration of confidence in the American shipbuilding industry.

“We are excited to be working with Ulstein, an established market leader in vessel design for offshore wind. We look forward to pushing the envelope in the offshore wind industry where Jones Actcompliant vessels are concerned.”

Aeolus has contracted with Ulstein for an SOV based on Ulstein’s proven SX195 design. The vessel will be fully customised to Aeolus’s specifications.

Ulstein Design & Solutions is working on a new SOV concept for the US market

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

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SERVICE OPERATION VESSELS | 43

Innovative vessels bridge gap between SOVs and CTVs Operation and maintenance units in the offshore wind industry tend to be categorised as crew transfer or service operation vessels, but there is a ‘third way’ say owners of a small but growing number of mid-size units that fit into a niche between the two

MHO Esbjerg has been contracted by Ørsted for the Hornsea Project One offshore windfarm

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rew transfer vessels (CTV) have become a familiar feature of the offshore wind energy industry, transporting windfarm technicians to and from turbines in order to maintain them. They vary a little in size and capacity, and sometimes also undertake roles other than personnel transfer, which is usually accomplished by a pushing against a transition piece so that windfarm personnel can ‘step over’ onto a turbine.

But as windfarms have been built farther and farther from shore, so the need has arisen for larger vessels that can operate in more difficult conditions, remain at sea and provide accommodation for technicians and storage for their equipment.

These highly sophisticated, very specialised service operation vessels (SOVs), or ‘walk-to-work’ ships as they have become known, are larger and more expensive but can remain at sea for long periods, provide accommodation for windfarm technicians, have significant storage space for equipment, and usually

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transfer workers to turbines via motioncompensated offshore gangways. Some now even have motion-compensated cranes and can service multiple windfarms.

But not all windfarms are alike and they can’t neatly be categorised as those that can be serviced by CTVs and those that are the domain of their larger cousins because they are farther offshore.

It is increasingly being recognised that depending on factors such as distance from shore, the number of turbines to be serviced, conditions offshore, and the number of personnel and amount of equipment needed offshore that a mid-sized vessel with greater range, seakeeping and enhanced accommodation spaces can provide a third way while avoiding the expense associated with contracting an SOV. Mid-size vessels of this type, sitting between a CTV and SOV in terms of capability and cost, have been selected for a number of projects, among them by offshore wind developer Ørsted, which has contracted

a 39-m unit from MH-O & Co in Denmark.

The new, mid-size unit, to be named MHO Esbjerg, is one of a number of vessels contracted by Ørsted for the Hornsea Project One offshore windfarm.

To be based in Grimsby on the northeast coast of the UK, the three vessels include two 27.4m vessels built by Piriou and the 39-m Fast Supply Cat (FSC) designed by MH-O director and board member Mik Henriksen working closely with naval architect Incat Crowther in co-operation with Ørsted. The 27.4m units are Rix Lynx and Rix Leopard, operated by UK-based Rix Sea Shuttle Ltd. MH-O & Co is actually building two examples of the 39-m FSCs at BTS Shipyard in Surabaya, Indonesia with delivery of the first planned for late 2018/early 2019. This initial example of the type will go to work for Ørsted in 2019. The second is as yet uncontracted, but is being actively marketed by the company.

Mr Henriksen said the 39-m units fit

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44 | SERVICE OPERATION VESSELS

MH-O’s new design has deck space for containers and can remain at sea for up to 14 days without support

into a niche between CTVs and SOVs. “The vessels can still use boat landings,” he explained in an exclusive interview with OWJ, “but are large enough to carry a walk-towork or bring-to-work system.” He explained the focus of the design was on enhanced seakeeping and the ability to remain offshore for up to 14 days without support.

With a length of 39.2 m and breadth of 10.5 m they will have a cargo-carrying capacity of 60 tonnes, a speed of 25 knots, 190 m2 of deck space and be able to transport containers on deck.

The wheelhouse will have space for a charterers’ office, and Mr Henriksen said he anticipates they will be able to undertake personnel transfers in a significant wave height of 2.0 m Hs. Mr Henriksen explained he has a background in fast ferries and was familiar with using catamaran hullforms in that market. The hullform adopted for the 39-m FSC is derived from this kind of vessel. He explained the company has also developed designs for even larger catamaran hullform vessels for the offshore wind industry, including a 48-m unit that could undertake transfers in 2.5 m Hs. Apart from opportunities in Europe, the company is also exploring the potential of the burgeoning offshore wind energy market in Taiwan, and is working with Windpal, a consortium of European companies capable of providing integrated solutions for offshore wind project developers in Asia utilising European best practice and experience in offshore wind. “We have been studying the conditions offshore Taiwan and believe the 39-m unit can do well there,” he said.

Another leading operator of crew transfer vessels for the offshore wind energy industry is to manage

Offshore Wind Journal | 4th Quarter 2018

an innovative, purpose-built service accommodation and transfer vessel chartered specifically for use on a Taiwanese windfarm.

The 35-m service accommodation and transfer vessel (SATV) is being chartered

by Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy for use on the Formosa 1 offshore windfarm off the coast of Miaoli County in Taiwan. It will operate from the port of Taichung during the operations and maintenance phase of the offshore windfarm, starting in Q4 2019.

The vessel is capable of remaining offshore for at least seven days and will have 12 single cabins for wind turbine technicians. It will be registered under the Taiwanese flag and manned by Taiwanese crew trained by Njord Offshore.

Njord Offshore managing director Tom Mehew said the SATV was a significant milestone for the company’s footprint in the offshore wind market and provides “a new logistical model” that will enable technicians to be accommodated offshore and transfer directly to turbines without an offshore access gangway. “Ultimately this will save time and money,” he said.

“With the SATV, we’re offering a new offshore wind service solution which demonstrates our commitment to meeting our customers’ needs and reducing the cost of energy from offshore wind.

“The concept fits the bill perfectly for projects like Formosa 1 – a full 40-person service operation vessel would be oversized and a standard crew transfer vessel, which would have to return to port every night, would be undersized.”

Siemens Gamesa head of maritime and aviation solutions Rene Wigmans said the SATV “will also allow us to safely and efficiently address the challenging tidal

conditions in the Taiwan Strait.”

Earlier this year, the design phase and tank testing of another vessel that owner/designer Manor Renewable Energy described as “finding its inspiration somewhere between a CTV and walk-towork vessel” were completed.

In July 2018, Manor Renewable Energy said it planned to begin building the first example of its 40-m ‘technician support vessel’ in 2019. The design has cabins for eight crew members and 20 windfarm technicians, and takes lessons learnt from the company’s 2017 newbuild, Manor Venture, while bringing what the company claimed is a new concept to the sector.

The vessel will have the ability to push against a transition piece due to an engineered piston arrangement that minimises the impact of doing so, despite its large size compared with CTVs. The company said tank tests have shown it has the capability to transfer personnel in conditions that would defeat a conventional crew transfer unit.

Manor Renewable Energy operations director Toby Mead said, “at present the market moves from a 26-m CTV directly to a walk-to-work vessel 3-4 times that length.

There is little in the middle of that range and that’s the area we believe the sector is lacking. We believe a vessel in between the two could reduce the cost of operations and help reduce the levelised cost of energy.

“All-in-all,” he said, “the vessel will be fit-for-purpose, have extended endurance, be innovative in design and built for a team of technicians living in comfort.”

The vessel is being designed by Walker Marine Design and will be constructed at Manor’s own shipyard in Portland, Dorset. OWJ

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NG-8000X SELF-PROPELLED JACK-UP WITH TELESCOPIC LEG CRANE

FUTURE PROOF WIND TURBINE INSTALLATION

THE PIONEERS OF OFFSHORE ENGINEERING GustoMSC is a reputable design & engineering company of mobile offshore units and equipment. In close cooperation with our clients, we translate experience, science and technical knowledge into realistic & innovative ideas.

In this way, GustoMSC enables and supports safe and efficient operations at sea, contributing to a sustainable future.

www.gustomsc.com