Offshore wind: The making of a (supply chain) star
room for innovation in turbine construction, support shipping and subsea. Installations here, too, can seem encumbered and slow. Cables and power are said to be “laid” when they could be better “distributed.”To “catapult” a new wind supply chain into the fore, Norway is inviting supply chain hopefuls from around the world to an incubator program aimed at making offshore — and especially floating marine wind installations — as efficient as surface and subsea operations in offshore oil and gas. The Norwegian start-up program features The Sustainable
Subsea Mining: The Next Big Thing for UUVs
for mapping. Meanwhile, at INESC TEC and elsewhere, including the University of Hawaii, underwater mining tools target the whole gamut of mining-support tasks.High-stakes opsSome high-capital mining and subsea players have already surged ahead, if mostly in the dredging of coastal zones. Earlier out than Norway, Papua New Guinea, Japan and the Cooke Islands have created rules to govern this nascent industry.Toronto-listed Nautilus Minerals is deeply involved in the Bismarck Sea project, Solwara 1, where the world’s first, large-scale, deep-sea mining project at depths of 1,600 meters targets copper
Kongsberg Sells First Sounder USV
, and will help the company to meet its goal of becoming a world-leading company in the sphere of sustainable fishery. Following the initial delivery, Kongsberg and TASA will continue to collaborate in the operation of USVs for fishery applications.“The fishing industry is a key industry in both Norway and Peru, and we have to work together towards the sustainability of our resource by implementing new technology like the Sounder USV. We have to monitor the ocean from the surface in real-time, and monitor the healthiness of both the ocean and the fish stock,” added Dereck Zimmerman, Fleet
Wesmar Equips National Geographic Endurance
Lindblad Expeditions' new vessel National Geographic Endurance, billed as the world’s most advanced polar expedition ship, is currently under construction at Ulstein in Norway.The new expedition cruise ship features a range of state-of-the-art technologies that will help it to navigate safely through some of the world's most remote locations, including several planned cruises through Arctic and Antarctic waters.Wesmar’s EV860 sonar was chosen for the vessel for a variety of reasons, including its dual, forward-looking sonar and bottom profiler, the manufacturer said.“Wesmar
Subsea Cables Installed for NASR Phase 2
power cables (total length 147 kilometers) and 10 11-kilovolt subsea power cables (total length 57 kilometers) for the NASR oil field project, part of the ADNOC strategic development program to increase the field’s capacity to 65,000 barrels per day.A total of 204 kilometers of cable was loaded in Norway, and transported and installed at the project site in two separate trips with the cable laying vessel Isaac Newton. The vessel's carrying capacity allowed the longest and heaviest of all 13 cables, being the 71 kilometers long and almost 6,000 tons heavy, to be installed in a single length between
DNV GL To Perform Hywind Tampen Study
DNV GL said on Monday it is working with Equinor to undertake a third-party verification study of the Norwegian Hywind Tampen floating wind farm, expected to be the world’s first offshore wind farm powering oil platforms.Situated in the North Sea approximately 200 kilometers west of Florø, Norway, north of Gulfaks and south of Snorre, the Hywind Tampen project will consist of 11 8 MW turbines capable of meeting 35% of the annual power demand of the two oil fields, including the the five Snorre A and B, and Gullfaks A, B and C platforms. The introduction of floating offshore wind could cut
A SmallSat AUV Network
in space.Adding depth: the full range of ocean views. Illustrations courtesy Professor Kanna RajanNASA-quality supervisorEnter the Norwegians. Funding that’s hard to fathom, for some, and experience storing and processing vast volumes of data (like the results of seismic surveys) are part of Norway’s contribution to AUV and AUV-based research.Add to that a growing SmallSat faculty, two AIS satellites and a handful of “space” outfits, including some with military ties. While the researcher haul of all three “schools” — Porto, NASA and NTNU — is large
One-on-One with Martin McDonald, SVP, ROV Division, Oceaneering
rig, from our operations center in Houston while also performing autonomous docking functions. Remote piloting technology is maturing and is currently operational in the North Sea, where we have a number of contracts. We’re piloting ROVs remotely from our mission support center in Stavanger, Norway. This center has enabled us to complement ROV operations offshore with onshore operations. The same skilled pilots are working between offshore and onshore locations on rotations, and this is a new way of working.To accomplish this, our equipment has to be reliable. We are investing significant energy
Researchers Study Unique Arctic Channel
gullies, led to a distinction of an area partially subjected to the flow of glacigenic debris flow (southern area) and a fully protected area by the proximity to the Bear Island (northern area).”As part of the study, which also included participation from experts at the University of Tromsø (Norway), among other institutions, erosive structures in the most southern area were mapped, “which suggest the presence of relict mass transport deposits (MTD) crossing the upper slope with a SE-NW orientation,” Rui said.The morphological analysis of the furthest area “could suggest some
The Decommissioning, Marine Life Connection
oil major sponsors, included the discovery that the protected cold-water coral Lophelia pertusa on facilities in the northern North Sea (notably, Thistle A and the now derogated structure of Murchison) could potentially be supplying larvae that drift from these structures to natural coral ecosystems off Norway. Specifically, these two structures seem capable of supplying the Aktivneset marine protected area, which had been severely damaged by historical fisheries activity, and which is now beginning to recover. It could be that this is due to coral larvae drifting in from North Sea platforms.Phase 1 of
TechnipFMC Wins Johan Sverdrup 2 Contract
TechnipFMC said on Wednesday it has secured a contract from Norwegian operator Equinor for the delivery and installation of the subsea production system the at Johan Sverdrup Phase 2 development offshore Norway.The award covers the delivery and installation of the subsea production system including integrated template structures, manifolds, tie-in and controls equipment. Equinor said the production system consists of five templates and a total of 18 X-mas trees with associated components.TechnipFMC did not specify an exact dollar amount, but said the contract is worth between $75 million and $250
Pioneering Spirit Gets a Scrub Down
Spirit, received a robotic hull cleaning during a recent port call in Rotterdam.The Allseas owned multipurpose vessel, which is on a temporary break from Nord Stream 2 pipelaying activities, made a stop in Rotterdam to prepare for upcoming topsides lift works at the giant Johan Sverdrup project offshore Norway. While in port, a robotic Fleet Cleaner vehicle cleaned the 382-meter-long vessel's hull despite stormy weather, cold temperatures and wind force 7 Bft. Although the storm increased turbulence in the water, causing almost zero underwater visibility, the Fleet Cleaner was still able to perform
Prysmian to Supply Cables for French Floating Wind Farm
floating wind farm will include three Siemens Gamesa 8.4 MW wind turbines installed on float systems in the so-called Faraman zone, 17 km off the coast. Commissioning is scheduled in 2021.All submarine cables for the project will be produced in the manufacturer’s centers of excellence in Drammen, Norway and Vilanova, Spain, while the land cables will be manufactured in the Gron plant in France, Prysmian said.“It is the first turnkey project for a floating wind farm ever developed by the group, where we employ our innovative dynamic 66 kV submarine cables with EPR insulation. This project is
PSA Audits Xmas Tree for Snorre Expansion
Norway's offshore watchdog the Petroleum Safety Authority (PSA) said it has carried out an audit of Equinor and the fabrication of the subsea Christmas tree for the Snorre expansion project.The objective of the February audit was to ensure that fabrication of the subsea Christmas tree for the Snorre expansion project complied with the company’s own requirements and requirements in the regulations, PSA said. A sub-goal was to follow up how the project is undertaking its supervisory duty in respect of its supplier, TechnipFMC.PSA siad it did not identify any non-conformities during the audit
Chevron to Use Subsea Compression at Jansz-Io
Aker Solutions announced Tuesday it has been awarded a master contract to support the delivery of a subsea compression system for the Chevron Australia-operated Jansz-Io field offshore Australia, marking the first time the technology will be used outside of Norway.Compression helps to maintain plateau gas production rates as reservoir pressure drops over time, but such compressors have typically been installed on platforms over sea level. Placing this equipment on the seabed and near the wellheads improves recovery rates and reduces capital and operating costs, Aker Solutions said.The first
Real-time ECDIS Updates via FleetBroadband
charts seamlessly and securely, on demand and without interrupting their primary bandwidth service,” said Ronald Spithout, President, Inmarsat Maritime. “The contract signing followed laboratory tests of the new ECDIS-update application at Inmarsat’s R&D facilities in Ålesund, Norway, and full sea-trials conducted by SRH Marine over a three-month period.”The APN also provides the platform for FleetBroadband to host other real-time vessel management applications from other third-party suppliers, with Inmarsat planning to roll-out a suite of new applications that can work
Catamaran and AUV Complete Joint Survey
Norwegian and Canadian partners have completed geophysical area survey in Norway using an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) and small catamaran concept.In September 2018 DOF Subsea Norway AS was awarded a contract for The Norwegian Public Roads Administration, Statens Vegvesen (SVV), to perform geophysical mapping of a 5km2 area in Bjørnafjord in Norway. The project was executed using the Hugin AUV Chercheur manufactured by Kongsberg Maritime and owned and operated by Canadian company Ocean Floor Geophysics Inc. (OFG) in combination with the small survey catamaran GeoCat owned by DOF Subsea
