Floating wind turbines-powered grid could connect to North Sea platforms
Offshore staff
LONDON — Cerulean Winds plans a North Sea Renewables Grid (NSRG), an offshore integrated green power and transmission system driven by floating offshore wind turbines that oil and gas platforms could connect to.
The company and partner Frontier Power International aim to develop three 333-sq-km sites comprising hundreds of floating turbines producing multiple gigawatts of electricity, after securing multiple leases in the recent Crown Estate Scotland INTOG round.
Their location close together in the central UK North Sea would provide access for platforms to a basin-wide offshore transmission system, offsetting millions of tons of production emissions.
Others involved in the consortium include NOV, Siemens Gamesa, Siemens Energy, DEME and Worley. Cerulean Winds estimates the overall investment cost at about £20 billion ($25 billion).
Phase 1 of the NSRG would focus on supporting oil and gas operators with brownfield modifications. Future phases would export green power to the grids in southern UK and mainland Europe.
Dan Jackson, founding director of Cerulean Winds, said, “The oil and gas sector is wrestling with the challenges of meeting the North Sea Transition Deal emissions reduction targets whilst supporting UK energy security. We recognize that to achieve meaningful reductions at the pace required, a reliable basin-wide approach is needed that they can plug into when they are ready to for affordable power. Early oil and gas electrification supports the country’s energy security, net zero action and delivers huge benefits to the supply chain and economy, creating 10,000 jobs. With our partners, we will accelerate access to green power and provide the infrastructure for the next phase of the North Sea’s life.”
Humza Malik, founding partner of Frontier Power, added, “Each wind farm site is located within 100 km of the others and will be connected together to form the offshore ring main around the central North Sea.
A high-voltage alternating current (HVAC) transmission will provide availability and redundancy for maximizing generation uptime. The scale allows for offtake to other parts of the North Sea through a new high-voltage direct current (HDVC) network.
Malik continued, “For the oil and gas companies, this diversity of offtake provides robustness to the scheme and added flexibility. For Scotland, the HVDC transmission not only provides clean energy to the national grid, but provides export of power directly to continental Europe.”
Cerulean Winds’ industrial partners will seek to de-risk the project in a similar way to other large-scale infrastructure developments are initiated. The company claims the three wind farms could provide more than £12 billion ($14.9 billion) to the UK’s economy.
Jackson added, “We are targeting a buildout before ScotWind developments, allowing the supply chain to respond, creating crucial partnering opportunities for the ports and getting the market ready to deliver floating wind at scale. Work with end users has begun in earnest so that we can aim for first power availability in 2028.”
05.16.2023
