On average, European offshore wind turbines stand in 29 meters (95 feet) of water about 44 kilometers (27 miles) from the shore, WindEurope reports. These two stats underscore one of the key reasons why offshore wind in U.S. waters is a flyspeck compared to the installed capacity of European wind farms.
The first U.S. offshore wind farm added a scant 30 megawatts of electrical capacity when construction wrapped up in 2016. By contrast, grid-connected capacity of European offshore wind farms rose by more than 1,600 MW in 2016 alone — with 338 new wind turbines expanding total capacity to 12,600 MW, according to WindEurope.
European leaders deserve plenty of credit for achieving bold offshore-wind goals, but that’s not the only force at work in Europe’s offshore-power dominance. The waters of the North, Irish, and Baltic seas tend to be shallow near the shoreline and fall gradually to maximum depths.
This is the optimum terrain for today’s offshore-wind technologies — and it’s abundant. By contrast, the entire west coast of the U.S. plunges deeply into the Pacific Ocean just off the shoreline. The continental shelf on the Atlantic Coast and the Gulf of Mexico is much larger and shallower, but the specter of summer hurricanes casts a cloud on projects in warmer southern climes.
In essence, the most promising proposals for wind farms in U.S. waters lie in the cooler waters from the Carolinas northward to Maine. These waters boast a gently sloping continental shelf, much like the areas dotted with wind farms off the coast of Northern Europe. And while these northern waters are no strangers to fierce storms, they generally do not experience the destructive force of hurricanes.
Turning to deep-water development
Europe’s massive lead over North America in offshore wind shouldn’t obscure one central fact: European countries have fulfilled only a fraction of their offshore-wind power goals. And, like an apple tree bereft of low-hanging fruit, they have already developed many of the most valuable offshore-wind sites.
As offshore wind projects move farther from the coastline in Europe, naturally the water gets deeper. Soon, the fixed foundations for wind turbines will become prohibitively difficult to manufacture and install. This challenge invites the development of floating offshore wind platforms.
Floating platforms sound promising on paper, but only a few demonstration projects have gotten off the drawing board. But that could rapidly change in the space of a few years, according to WindEurope, the trade association for European wind power.
In a report issued in June 2017, WindEurope stated that floating platforms are ready for commercial development, and that costs could soon plunge as the technology enters the mainstream.
“Floating offshore wind offers a vast potential for growth,” WindEurope said. “80% of all the offshore wind resource is located in waters 60m and deeper in European seas, where traditional bottom-fixed offshore is less attractive. At 4,000 GW, it is significantly more than the resource potential of the U.S. and Japan combined.”
The report listed seven floating-platform projects in the works in Scotland, Ireland, Portugal, France, and the UK with nearly 350 MW of capacity that are expected to be commissioned in the next four years.
Taking a cue from offshore oil development
PMI has long provided premium cable accessories to oil-development companies, so we have a healthy respect for the difficulties in extracting energy from the deep ocean. And we’ve admired the ability of our industry partners to overcome these challenges.
But accidents happen despite the best efforts of the industry. Though floating offshore wind farms pose their share of environmental threats, there’s little chance of them being blamed for massive oil spills.
That’s one of the best reasons to be optimistic about the potential of offshore wind in the U.S. And as European developers build out floating platforms and drive down costs, American developers would be well advised to take advantage of the inevitable innovations that emerge.
The third of four Ramform Titan-class vessels, the Ramform Tethys, was celebrated in a naming ceremony at the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Shipbuilding Co. yard in Nagasaki, Japan today.
PGS’ two first Ramform Titan-class vessels, the Ramform Titan and the Ramform Atlas were delivered in 2013 and 2014 and have delivered beyond expectations on all aspects, especially within safety, efficiency and productivity.
The Ramform Tethys, and the Ramform Hyperion, will be even better due to small modifications of equipment handling on the back deck and an increase in engine power to 26 400 kW from 23 040 kW on the first two Ramform Titan-class vessels.
“With the increased power output and the back deck modifications we are enhancing the Ramform Titan-class acquisition platform further. Productivity, safety, stability and redundancy are the key benefits of these vessels. Their ability to tow many streamers gives high data quality with dense cross-line sampling and cost efficient acquisition with wide tows,” says Per Arild Reksnes, EVP Operations.
The Ramform Tethys is the most powerful and efficient marine seismic acquisition vessel in the world, and along with the Ramform Titan and Ramform Atlas, the widest ships ever at the waterline.
The design dovetails advanced maritime technology to the imaging capabilities of the GeoStreamer® seismic acquisition technology. Her 70 meter broad stern is fully exploited with 24 streamer reels: 16 reels aligned abreast and 8 reels further forward, with capacity for 12 kilometer streamers on each reel. With such capabilities the Ramform Tethys has tremendous flexibility and redundancy for high capacity configurations. Increased work space and advanced equipment handling mean safer and even more robust operations. The Ramform concept design is made by Roar Ramde.
She carries over 6 000 tons of fuel and equipment. She will typically tow a network of several hundred thousand recording sensors over an area greater than 12 square kilometers, equivalent to nearly 1 200 soccer pitches, or 3.5 times Central Park.
For PGS and its clients, more rapid deployment and retrieval of equipment, as well as greater operational capacity will translate into faster completion of surveys and increased uptime in marginal weather. The period between major yard stays is also extended by approximately 50%.
The Ramform Tethys sets the new standard for seismic operations for the next 25 years.
Jon Erik Reinhardsen, President and CEO of PGS states in a comment: “The Ramform Tethys further strengthens our fleet productivity and together with the other Ramform Titan-class vessels will enhance our competitive edge. In the current challenging market environment we also experience more demand for our best capacity and Ramform Tethys will add to PGS ultra-high-end value proposition.”
NOTE: Pictures and more facts on the Ramform Tethys are available on www.pgs.com
For details, contact:
Bård Stenberg, VP IR & Corporate Communications
Mobile: +47 992 45 235
Synthetic cable is stronger than steel on a strength-to-weight basis, which makes it an attractive option in marine environments. The key challenge of synthetic cable is what you do about the attachment points, or terminations.
Terminations can cut the tensile strength of synthetic cable by more than 50 percent, potentially defeating the purpose of going with synthetic to begin with. However, a well-designed and properly installed termination can preserve more than 75 percent of the cable’s strength.
The termination must be installed by the manufacturer of the termination. It can’t be installed like a traditional steel termination can. That means if you’re ordering a volume of synthetic fiber cable, you need to ship it to your cable accessory supplier and have them cut your cable to length and attach the terminations.
Once the termination is in place, it’s there permanently. It cannot be removed. Hence it pays to be careful about your choice of synthetic cable termination provider.
Getting it Right with Synthetic Cable Terminations
Synthetic cables have a vast range of uses in subsea environments. They can do high-tech jobs like protecting fiber optic cables that transmit data around the world. Or they can do more mundane tasks like holding floating platforms in place.
Each of these jobs require terminations and other accessories that are engineered specifically to get the most performance out of the cable and preserve its strength at the attachment point.
At PMI, we’ve worked with clients in the subsea cable sector for decades, so we know exactly how to apply the right termination for each application. We have the specialized equipment required to perform synthetic terminations, and we have people trained to make sure the attachment is done properly.
And, of course, we supply some of the world’s best subsea cable terminations for all these varied applications.
Synthetic cables are less prone to corrosion and much more flexible and easy to use in chaotic marine environments. Many of them even float. But their unique chemical composition requires extra care at the termination point. Ignoring this risk could easily undo your entire investment in synthetic cables.
PMI Industries, Inc. is proud to announce that as of January 16, 2017, it has been ISO 9001: 2015 with Design certified with regard to the design, manufacture and distribution of offshore, subsea cable hardware assemblies and testing services.
PMI is delighted to serve our customers even better through the well-defined and documented processes this certification requires. While PMI has always been committed to quality in its products and services, this certification ensures a more productive environment through faster identification and resolution of quality issues, among many other benefits.
“This certification is a reflection of our longstanding commitment to quality, continuous improvement and our customers,” said Bob Schauer, President of PMI Industries, Inc. “We’re very proud of the dedication put forth by the PMI team.”
PMI partnered with Smithers Quality Assessments, an accredited quality and environmental management systems certification body, to achieve certification.
For more information about PMI Industries’ products and services for offshore oil and gas, please visit pmiind.com, and for more information about PMI Industries’ products and services in offshore renewable energy, please visit powerofpmi.com.
Cleveland, OH—PMI Industries, Inc. is proud to announce that as of January 16, 2017, it has been ISO 9001: 2015 with Design certified with regard to the design, manufacture and distribution of offshore, subsea cable hardware assemblies and testing services.
PMI is delighted to serve our customers even better through the well-defined and documented processes this certification requires. While PMI has always been committed to quality in its products and services, this certification ensures a more productive environment through faster identification and resolution of quality issues, among many other benefits.
“This certification is a reflection of our longstanding commitment to quality, continuous improvement and our customers,” said Bob Schauer, President of PMI Industries, Inc. “We’re very proud of the dedication put forth by the PMI team.”
PMI partnered with Smithers Quality Assessments, an accredited quality and environmental management systems certification body, to achieve certification.
For more information about PMI Industries’ products and services for offshore oil and gas, please visit pmiind.com, and for more information about PMI Industries’ products and services in offshore renewable energy, please visit powerofpmi.com.
The first U.S. offshore wind farm is expected to go online by the end of 2016, ushering in what could be a new era of renewable energy in the United States.
This is welcome news in a nation where land-based wind power has exploded over the past two decades, installing nearly 50,000 wind turbines that provide clean energy across the continent. Can the same spirit of innovation that made U.S. land-based wind power a world leader be applied to offshore power?
We’d like to think so, but, admittedly, there is a long way to go. The new Block Island Wind Farm is barely a blip on the nation’s energy map — powering just 17,000 households in a nation of 325 million people.
Completed in August at a cost of $290 million, the Block Island Wind Farm consists of five turbines towering over the waters of the Atlantic Coast south of Rhode Island. It might not sound like much in an age where thousands of offshore wind turbines pump carbon-free electricity to Germany, the U.K. and other European nations.
But it’s difficult to exaggerate the importance of the U.S. finally dipping its toes in the water, so to speak, of offshore wind. An abundance of caution on American shores had thwarted every previous offshore wind project. Now that offshore wind technology is mature thanks to a couple decades of European development, the U.S. is poised to reap the benefits of potentially cheaper offshore wind power.
This helps explain why several states along the Eastern Seaboard are embracing offshore wind power:
- The governor of Massachusetts approved a program in August allowing up to 1,600 megawatts of offshore wind projects in the next decade.
- New York approved a plan in August that says renewable power sources (wind, solar, etc.) must account for half of the state’s energy output in 2030. In September, the state released a blueprint for an offshore wind master plan to be completed in 2017.
- At the University of Maine, researchers are working with federal grants from the Department of Energy to develop prototypes of floating wind-farm platforms that can overcome many of the challenges associated with fixed offshore wind turbines. A French defense firm that’s moving into the renewables sector also has joined the project.
Projects on the drawing boards could add nearly 5 gigawatts of offshore wind power in the United States — a mere fraction of the estimated 4,200 gigawatts of energy that could be generated in the domestic waters of the United States.
Any offshore wind projects will have to overcome substantial regulatory and financial hurdles before any electricity starts streaming back to the mainland. But it’s worth the effort.
Why offshore wind is crucial to the U.S. energy equation
Offshore wind technology is more expensive to install and maintain than its land-based counterparts. But ocean breezes are stronger and more consistent than the wind passing over land, which creates the potential for much more efficient wind-energy operations installed offshore.
In effect we can conceivably pull more power from fewer turbines if offshore wind technology matures. Installing and maintaining these towers will require substantial expertise, which could produce a lot of steady jobs for coastal communities.
Meanwhile, the U.S. fracking boom that has done so much for the nature’s energy posture — lowering gas and oil costs and reducing the dominance of OPEC — remains politically controversial. If the public tide were to turn against fracking, we could see renewed pressure to tap green-energy sources like offshore wind.
Embracing the power of our oceans
At PMI, we’re strong believers in the potential of marine energy technologies because we’ve been providing rugged cable accessories to offshore industries for decades. To be viable, offshore wind farms must be able to cope with ever-present threats to subsea power cables that transmit electricity back to the mainland. Our cable terminations, cable protection and splices are built to withstand the worst our oceans can deal out, so naturally we’re embracing the potential of offshore wind.
The oceans alone won’t fix all of America’s energy problems, of course. But they should be part of the solution.
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Gravity from the sun and moon tugs at the surface of our oceans, creating tides that move massive quantities of water across broad expanses of shoreline twice a day. All that moving water produces kinetic energy we can convert into electrical power.
Though all of the earth’s continents have shorelines and tides, we haven’t done much with all that energy. To date, tidal energy technology generally takes two forms:
- Tidal current converters. These devices are typically underwater turbines that look much like a wind turbine and capture energy from water moving past the blades.
- Coastal barrages. A barrage is a kind of dam across the opening of an estuary. It works much like a hydroelectric plant, except that it uses turbines to capture energy from rising tidewater rather than river water.
Current technologies offer only a glimpse at tidal energy’s potential. To get the whole picture, we need to weigh the pros and cons of tidal energy.
Here’s a quick summary: (more…)
Generating electricity from waves or tides requires placing large mechanical devices in the middle of complex, fragile ecosystems. How will life respond to these intrusions?
Because we’re so early in the evolution of marine energy, environmental concerns post a host of serious questions, such as:
What have we learned from the development of artificial reefs?
Fixed structures in the ocean naturally invite the arrival of reef species, creating artificial reefs. If the introduction of reef species boosts the biodiversity of a marine energy project area, the development could be a net benefit.
However, if reef species include predators that wipe out local species that have no natural defenses, then the effect could be negative. Early projects will have to be studied intensely to see how this works out.
How will migratory species respond?
A large network of marine energy devices could force migrating mammals, fish and birds to change their travel paths. Even subtle changes can throw off reproductive rhythms that evolved over millions of years. If these changes make it harder for migrating species to reproduce, or weaken them so they are more vulnerable to predators, the cost could be substantial.
Will wave-energy devices change the dynamics of shallow shorefront ecosystems?
Dozens or hundreds of marine-energy devices in a well-defined region can affect the velocity of waves striking the shore. Small changes in the depths of tidal pools or the thickness of sand layers could influence species’ ability to feed and reproduce. How will we determine an acceptable level of risk or damage in these scenarios?
Can wave energy devices pollute local waters?
Marine energy devices require lubricants that could potentially leak and cause pollution. Furthermore, the substantial corrosive nature of seawater will wear these machines down quickly, expanding the risk of pollution. Granted, most devices would not carry enough lubricants to create a substantial oil spill. But persistent small leaks spreading over months and years could still have a profound impact.
Can devices survive exposure to pollutants?
The concerns over potential pollution by marine energy devices shouldn’t obscure the possibility that offshore sites might already be polluted with chemicals that could damage these devices. Even undisturbed sites pose a challenge: Could large chemical or oil spills disable devices installed in them?
What happens to fisheries?
The livelihoods of people in the fishing industry depend on healthy ecosystems that support fisheries. Any project will have to weigh the economic, social and environmental impact on coastal industries like seafood.
How will environmental regulations affect marine energy projects?
Regulators and rule compliance will be a fact of life for the marine energy sector. Developers will need to court the regulators to figure out exactly what it takes to stay compliant. Regulators may also conduct impact assessments that discover rare endangered species, which could grind everything to a halt.
Finding the right ways to draw energy from our precious oceans
The rise of marine energy is a natural progression for PMI, which has been providing rugged, durable cable accessories to the energy-exploration industry for decades.
Though we are enthused about the possibilities of marine energy, we respect the need to tap this energy source without damaging delicate marine ecosystems. Sure, that adds extra layers of time, expense and complexity. But it’ll be worth it to keep our oceans as healthy as possible.
Wave power looks like a no-brainer at first glance. After all, oceans cover more than 70 percent of our planet’s surface, and waves lap up on the shores of all seven continents.
Just build machines to convert those waves into electricity and we’re all set, right?
Alas, wave energy challenges can be as deep as the ocean itself.
The future of the offshore wind market depends on where you’re standing.
- In Europe, the offshore wind market is so well established that new generations of equipment are replacing obsolete machinery.
- In North America, the industry is so new that it exists largely on the drawing boards of offshore-wind developers.
- In Asia, it’s somewhere in the middle as China ramps up its offshore wind capacity.
