Marubeni, bp form Japan wind venture
bp and Marubeni have agreed to establish a partnership targeting opportunities in offshore wind and potentially other decarbonization projects, including hydrogen.
They plan to jointly apply to acquire a 49% stake in a wind project offshore Japan, with
bp establishing a local offshore wind development team in Tokyo.
Japan is targeting 10 GW of offshore wind capacity by 2030 and 30-45 GW by 2040.
According to bp, Marubeni is one of the country’s leading offshore wind developer, and is lead partner in development, permitting and construction of the country’s first large-scale, commercial offshore wind farm project to date, the 140-MW Akita.
Marubeni has a total power generating capacity of around 12 GW and has also been involved in the development and operation of over 2GW of offshore/onshore wind power globally.
Heerema to install North Sea Dogger C wind substation
The Dogger Bank wind farm joint venture has contracted Heerema Marine Contractors to transport and install the Dogger Bank C offshore substation. This is the third 1.2-GW phase of the development: Dogger Bank C covers a 560-sq km (216-sq mi) area, 196 km (122 mi) from the coast of northeast England.
Hereema’s scope will include T&I of the 3,500-metric ton (3,858-ton) jacket foundation, four main piles, and the 9,500-metric ton (10,472-ton) offshore substation topsides.
It will perform offshore lifting to position the jacket foundation on the scour bed, using the main piles to provide jacket on-bottom stability. The offshore substation will be lifted from a barge prior to set-down on the jacket foundation. Dogger Bank’s partners are SSE Renewables, Equinor, and Eni. SSE Renewables is leading the development and construction while Equinor will take over as operator on completion in 2026.
The partners claim that this will be the world’s largest offshore wind farm, with an overall capacity of 3.6 GW that should cover 5% of the UK’s electricity demand.
Shell, Scottish Power pledge financial support for Scotland’s offshore wind sector
ScottishPower and Shell have confirmed they will commit £75 million ($98.9 million) to help the supply chain support the growth of Scotland’s offshore wind industry in Scotland.
At the start of this year they jointly secured the seabed rights to develop two new floating wind projects through Crown Estate Scotland’s ScotWind Leasing process.
MarramWind (3 GW) is offshore Scotland’s north-east coast, while CampionWind (2 GW) is off the east coast.
ScottishPower also won seabed rights for the 2-GW MachairWind fixed foundation project off the coast of Islay, western Scotland.
The funds will be spread across the schemes, with a £25-million ($33 million) fund linked to MachairWind provided by ScottishPower alone.
ScottishPower Renewables has Marex Risk and Consultancy the marine services contract for the East Anglia ONE windfarm off the Suffolk coast, eastern England.
The two-year contract with a one-year extension option covers all marine services for the windfarm’s operations and maintenance phase.
Model tests confirm GustoMSC Tri-Floater performance in harsh environment
GustoMSC has recently completed model tests on its proprietary Tri-Floater, a semisubmersible floater that it says is capable of hosting large wind turbines.
The tests were performed at the Océanide wave basin in southeast France on a 1:50 scale model of the Tri-Floater hosting the 15 MW NREL reference wind turbine. The floater was subjected to simultaneous wind, wave, and current loading in the wave basin.
Due to the optimized geometry of the submerged structure, the Tri-Floater design exhibited low accelerations at the wind turbine nacelle during the model tests, in good agreement with numerical predictions. Lower accelerations are particularly beneficial since these translate to lower load levels and ultimately lower steel weight of the structure which is one of the most important cost drivers in floating wind.
The Tri-Floater model was subjected to a wide range of environmental conditions to demonstrate the suitability of the design for most of the floating wind sites currently being considered. These included operational conditions which the wind turbine would normally see during its lifetime as well as extreme conditions which it would have to endure during storms. An extreme sea state with a significant wave height of 13.5 m and wind speed at hub height of 190 km/h was tested. GustoMSC says that the Tri-floater successfully passed this test and the results confirm the performance of the Tri-floater in harsh environments.
With the model test campaign completed and numerical models validated, GustoMSC says that the Tri-Floater design has reached Technology Readiness Level 4: “technology validated in lab.” Achieving this milestone strengthens the position of the Tri-Floater as contender for commercial tenders in the floating wind space in 2022 and beyond, the company says.
Aker, Mainstream build stake in Japan floating wind project
Aker Offshore Wind and Mainstream Renewable Power have closed a transaction giving them an initial 50% ownership of Progression Energy’s 800 MW-floating offshore wind project in Japanese waters.
The parties will now continue to mature the project. Aker Offshore Wind, as a part of the Aker group of companies, brings offshore and floating engineering experience, while Mainstream has a background in offshore wind development.
Progression Energy has a team in Japan with experience in engaging in discussions with relevant organizations such as fishing unions, and securing permits for its multiple projects.
Japan is seeking to expand its offshore wind energy capacity to 10 GW by 2030 and to 30-45 GW by 2040, according to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
Project areas for offshore floating wind are due to be tendered for interested companies to submit proposals.
Sembcorp Marine to construct ‘next-generation’ wind turbine vessel
Sembcorp Marine Rigs & Floaters has secured a contract to construct a Wind Turbine Installation Vessel (WTIV). This will be based on Sembcorp Marine’s in-house design, the result of a collaboration with the client.
Sembcorp says that the WTIV will be capable of handling the next generation of wind turbines which will be much large, with longer, lighter rotor blades, taller towers, and according to the company, more reliable drive trains, performance-optimizing control systems and multi-megawatt power generation.
Boskalis to install Dutch North Sea wind farm cables
TenneT has awarded Boskalis the contract for laying of the Hollandse Kust West Beta export cable in the Dutch North Sea.
The scope comprises installation of two 65-km (40.4-mi) long export cables that will connect the 700-MW Hollandse Kust West Beta offshore wind farm to TenneT’s onshore grid in the Netherlands.
In addition, Boskalis will install a 9-km (5.6-mi) 66-kV interconnector cable between the Hollandse Kust West Alpha and Hollandse Kust West Beta offshore substations.
Boskalis will execute the work in partnership with Orient Cables, which will design and supply the high-voltage cable system. The two 220-kV AC cable circuits will come ashore close to the onshore HV substation at Wijk aan Zee.
As part of the program, Boskalis will also remove unexploded ordnance from the seabed, also performing geotechnical and geophysical surveys, beach and seabed preparation works and laying and burial of the cables.
Hollandse Kust West Beta should start operating in 2025.
