CWind Taiwan nets BOP contract for Formosa 1 offshore wind farm

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CWind Taiwan has been awarded a balance of plant (BOP) contract for the Formosa 1 offshore wind farm.

The company is providing inspection and maintenance services to the 22 turbines at Formosa 1 Phase 1 and Formosa 1 Phase 2 sites, including internal and external inspections and painting.

Under the contract, signed with Formosa 1 Wind Power Co. ltd (FOWI), CWind has deployed its Taiwan-flagged crew transfer vessel Ocean Surveyor 3 and its in-house technicians in September 2020.

Since Formosa 1 is the first offshore wind farm in Taiwan to move into the operations and maintenance (O&M) phase, the first team of Taiwanese technicians to graduate from CWind Taiwan’s Global Wind Organisation (GWO) training school will work on the project, alongside their colleague senior technicians from CWind in Europe.

The Ocean Surveyor 3 CTV and its crew have been supporting the Formosa 1 project out of the Nanliao fishing harbour since 2016, and now have extensive knowledge of the sea conditions and familiarity with the local authorities there. The company will use the same port for its BOP campaign too, saying that utilising this location increases project efficiency as transit time is minimised.

Formosa 1 entered commercial operation on 27 December 2019.

The 128 MW wind farm consists of the 8 MW Formosa 1 Phase 1, inaugurated in May 2017, and the 120 MW Formosa 1 Phase 2 which was officially commissioned in November 2019.

Formosa 1’s first phase comprises two Siemens Gamesa 4 MW turbines and the second phase features 20 Siemens Gamesa 6 MW turbines.

by Adrijana Buljan

Source: Offshore Energy, Oct 15, 2020

Maersk Supply Service, Ørsted Working on Offshore Charging Buoy

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Danish offshore vessel specialist Maersk Supply Service and its compatriot offshore wind developer Ørsted have teamed up to test a prototype offshore charging buoy.

The buoy will act as a safe mooring point and a charging station for vessels, potentially displacing a significant amount of marine fuel with “green” electricity.

The prototype buoy has been developed by Maersk Supply Service while Ørsted is responsible for the buoy’s integration with the electrical grid at the offshore wind farm. The charging buoy will be tested in the second half of 2021, where it will supply overnight power to one of Ørsted’s service vessels.

The buoy can be used to charge the smaller battery- or hybrid-electrical vessels and to supply power to larger vessels, enabling them to turn off their engines when laying idle.

“By substituting fossil-based fuels with green electricity, virtually all emissions are eliminated while the buoy is in use,” Maersk Supply Service said.

Upon technical validation and commercial ramp up, the electrical charging buoy has significant potential, short to medium term, to contribute positively to reduce emissions for the maritime industry, the Danish offshore vessel operator said.

“This will happen through displacing tens of thousands of tons of fuel consumed every year in the wider maritime sector by enabling inactive vessels to turn engines off and replace energy consumption and charge batteries with renewable electricity. Within five years of global operation, Maersk Supply Service has the ambition to remove 5.5 million tons of CO2, additionally avoiding particulate matter, NOx, and Sox,” MSS said.

Intellectual rights publicly available

Ørsted plans to make any intellectual property created in designing the integration of the buoy into the offshore wind asset publicly available to maximize the uptake potential of this carbon reduction innovation across the offshore wind sector.

“As large parts of the global maritime fleet are getting ready to receive shore power in ports, timing is right for implementing this clean ocean-tech innovation. The charging buoy is applicable as a mooring point outside ports, in offshore wind farms, and near vicinity to other offshore installations. Additionally, it will further help limit the increasing vessel congestions and remove air pollution in port areas,” the two companies said in a statement.

Jonas Munch Agerskov, Managing Director for Offshore Renewables at Maersk Supply Service said: “The charging buoy tackles a multitude of problems; lower emissions, offering a safe mooring point for vessels, better power efficiency and eliminating engine noise. This is also a solution that can be implemented on a global scale, and one that can be adapted as the maritime industry moves towards hybridization and electrification.”

Mark Porter, Senior Vice President and Head of Operations at Ørsted Offshore:”Ørsted has set the ambitious target of having carbon neutral operations in 2025, which includes the operations of our offshore wind farms. Technical and commercial innovation is central to Ørsted’s ability to provide real, tangible solutions to achieve our operational ambitions – and we need our partners’ support. We are happy to team up with Maersk Supply Service to test this innovative charging buoy, which brings us a step closer to creating a world that runs entirely on green energy.”

For the demonstration phase of the project, Maersk Supply Service has received one of the largest EUDP grants (Energy Technology Development and Demonstration Programme, under the Danish Energy Agency) in 2020 supporting with DKK 22mn to the engineering and demonstration of the power buoy. The Danish Maritime Fund has provided initial co-financing to conceptualize the project.

Source: Marine Technology, Sep 28, 2020

In a First, ROVOP Inspects Offshore Installation via Video Link

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UK-based ROV services provider ROVOP has said it has delivered its first remote platform-based inspection, repair, and maintenance workscope, “effectively reducing the number of personnel required offshore,” on Premier Oil’s Balmoral floating production vessel in the UK North Sea.

The ROV company carried out remote visual and NDT inspections of hull sections, flowlines, umbilicals, and risers, along with chain inspection, measurement, and cleaning, on the Balmoral unit with the help of a live video stream.

“Using the latest communications and modeling technology, ROVOP worked closely with Premier Oil to develop a robust live video streaming service back to shore. Two-way open communications allowed the inspection and data recording engineers to run the workscope remotely from onshore, resulting in three less people on board the vessel, where accommodation is limited due to the COVID-imposed restrictions,” ROVOP said.

Premier Oil, which on Tuesday said it would merge with Chrysaor, last month filed the decommissioning plan for the Balmoral FPV and the associated subsea infrastructure. The Balmoral platform was installed in the Balmoral Area in 1986.

ROVOP said that the cloud-based viewing platform allowed those working from home to view the inspection work as it unfolded.

“They were able to see exactly what the ROV and inspection engineers were seeing in real-time. Data, which would once have taken weeks to return from offshore to be analyzed, was captured as those watching onshore were able to influence the operation live, making the campaign much more efficient,” ROVOP said.

Credit: ROVOP

Also, ROVOP selected subsea mooring inspection and integrity engineering specialists Welaptega, an Ashtead Technology company, to support the project. Welaptega’s mooring inspection and 3D modeling photogrammetry equipment was integrated into the ROV to enable accurate and repeatable chain measurement and 3D modeling of the subsea template.

The point cloud data produced will be used to assist the planning of the template removal, ROVOP said.

The main components of the Balmoral field consist of; the Balmoral FPV, Balmoral Template, 11 template and 10 satellite wells, a riser system, pipelines, umbilicals, and cables.

Paul Hudson, ROVOP’s sales and marketing director, said: “Reducing numbers of people offshore has clear benefits in terms of risk, cost and overall efficiency and, of course, it is particularly relevant when dealing with the challenges presented to the offshore industry by the coronavirus pandemic. This project underlines how digitalization and collaboration can address some of our most pressing industry challenges.”

David Robertson, diving & ROV engineer with Premier Oil, added: “This is a fantastic achievement for both ROVOP and Premier Oil.  Through a lot of hard work and collaboration with respective network technology companies, we managed to de-risk personnel traveling to an offshore installation during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Executing work of this nature from an installation is always challenging due to bed space requirements. We have proven that inspection activities can be done with a significant reduction in manpower offshore, which potentially paves the way for cost and greenhouse gas reductions across our other assets in the future”.

Source: Marine Technology Oct 7, 2020

‘Blue’ Ammonia Breakthrough Announced

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40 tons shipped from Saudi Arabia to Japan for zero-carbon power generation

Saudi Aramco said it has shipped 40 tons of “blue” ammonia from Saudi Arabia to Japan for use in zero-carbon power generation.

The announcement comes amid growing appreciation of the role hydrogen will play in the global energy system. Ammonia, a compound consisting of three parts hydrogen and one part nitrogen, can contribute to addressing the challenge of meeting the world’s growing energy needs in a reliable, affordable and sustainable manner, the company said.

“The use of hydrogen is expected to grow in the global energy system, and this world’s first demonstration represents an exciting opportunity for Aramco to showcase the potential of hydrocarbons as a reliable and affordable source of low-carbon hydrogen and ammonia,” said Ahmad O. Al-Khowaiter, Aramco’s chief technology officer. “This milestone also highlights a successful transnational, multi-industry partnership between Saudi Arabia and Japan. Multinational partnerships are key in realizing the Circular Carbon Economy, championed by the Saudi Arabian G20 Presidency. Aramco continues to work with various partners around the world, finding solutions through the deployment of breakthrough technologies to produce low-carbon energy and address the global climate challenge.”

The Saudi-Japan blue ammonia supply network demonstration spanned the full value chain, including the conversion of hydrocarbons to hydrogen and then to ammonia, as well as the capture of associated carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

It overcame challenges associated with the shipping of blue ammonia to Japan for use in power plants, with 30 tons of CO2 captured during the process designated for use in methanol production at SABIC’s Ibn-Sina facility and another 20 tons of captured CO2 being used for Enhanced Oil Recovery at Aramco’s Uthmaniyah field.

This milestone highlights one of several pathways within the concept of a global Circular Carbon Economy, a framework in which CO2 emissions are reduced, removed, recycled and reused as opposed to being released into the atmosphere.

Toyoda Masakazu, chairman and chief executive officer of IEEJ, said blue ammonia is critical to Japan’s zero carbon emission ambitions to sustain the balance between the environment and the economy.

“About 10% of power in Japan can be generated by 30 million tons of blue ammonia,” Masakazu said. “We can start with co-firing blue ammonia in existing power stations, eventually transitioning to single firing with 100% blue ammonia. There are nations such as Japan which cannot necessarily utilize Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) or EOR due to their geological conditions. The carbon neutral blue ammonia/hydrogen will help overcome this regional disadvantage.”

Dr. Fahad Al-Sherehy, vice president of Energy Efficiency and Carbon Management at SABIC, said SABIC can economically leverage existing infrastructure for hydrogen and ammonia production with CO2 capture.

“Our experience in the full supply chain along with integrated petrochemicals facilities will play an important role in providing blue ammonia to the world,” he said.

Ammonia contains approximately 18% hydrogen by weight and is already a widely traded chemical on the world stage. It releases zero CO2 emissions when combusted in a thermal power plant and has the potential to make a significant contribution to an affordable and reliable low-carbon energy future. SABIC and Mitsubishi Corp., which is represented on the IEEJ study team involved in the project, are overseeing the transport logistics in partnership with JGC Corp., Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Engineering, Ltd., Mitsubishi Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. and UBE Industries, Ltd.

Source: Diesel & Gas Turbine Worldwide