Offshore staff
LEIDSCHENDAM, the Netherlands — Fugro has completed a geotechnical site investigation at the IJmuiden Ver (Noord) V and VI wind farm sites in the Dutch North Sea for the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO).
Staff working from a third-party vessel deployed the company’s new Blue Snake geotechnical equipment for 25 co-located cone penetration tests (CPT), thermal CPTs and high-performance corer tests.
Michel Vrolijk, an RVO consultant for offshore wind energy, said, “With the 21 GW planned on the Netherlands’ Offshore Wind Energy Roadmap 2030/31, offshore site investigations need to speed up.”
Blue Snake was able to perform a vibrocore in combination with a CPT in a single deployment. The short fixed distance between the CPT and vibrocore should allow for better correlation between data, he added.
Fugro’s system integrates CPT and sampling technology, with tests taken consecutively, at a fixed distance, improving data correlation, the company claims. The combination of integrated testing and reduced manual and crane handling is said to improve productivity.
The IJmuiden Ver V and VI areas are in the northern part of the IJmuiden Ver wind farm zone and will accommodate about 2 GW of offshore wind capacity, in addition to the 4 GW of capacity already planned for this zone.
07.11.2022
