OFFSHORE ACCOMMODATION
NEARSHORE & FARSHORE WIND FARMS
ADDITIONAL SPECIALIST MAINTENANCE
A WHOLE DIFFERENT BALLGAME
Farshore wind farms also bring with them additional specialist maintenance requirements. Due to their distance and lengths of cables, there will be a large number of Transformer Substations and HVDC Convertor Platforms each with its own requirement to cater for the permanent maintenance personnel.
UK REGULATORY REGIME
In UK waters, the regulatory approach to offshore maintenance activities will most likely follow a similar framework used for the oil & gas industry as laid down and monitored by the UK’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE).
All offshore oil and gas activities are managed the use of a Combined Operations Safety Case as required under the Offshore Installations (Safety Case) Regulations 2005 (SCR05). Safety Cases are risk based with the Duty Holder (Operator) being required to set out Performance Standards which then forms the basis of how all activities are then implemented. A similar approach is also used in the Norwegian sector.
Apart from a few exceptions, most of the offshore wind farms developed in Europe so far have been located near to shore enabling routine maintenance activities to be supported from onshore support bases using either small craft or helicopters for personnel access.
UK ROUND 3
With the planned developments now moving further out into deeper waters far from shore, the routine maintenance logistics become more complex and this especially the case for UK Round 3 wind farms which are all located beyond the 12 mile territorial limit at distances of up to 100 miles.
CONSIDERATIONS
There are many different influencing factors to consider when planning the maintenance logistics of these far from shore wind farms. In deeper waters, the foundations will be different to the typical monopole or gravity based types that have dominated the shallow near to shore developments and most likely these will be jackets or even floating structures. Boarding jacket foundations requires a similar type of access device currently used for monopiles. The round trip times for these vessels means that only close to shore developments can be served from shore based vessels.
It is expected that the HSE will require the same Safety Case risk based approach to the operations and maintenance activities required by the far from shore wind farm developments.
OIL AND GAS EXPERIENCE Oil and gas platforms vary but are essentially either fixed steel jackets or gravity base structures or floating units such as FPSOs, FPUs or Drilling Rigs. Routine access to all of these is by helicopter.
Over the years the use of boat or crane basket transfer of personnel has become virtually outlawed due to the inherent risks and the accidents that have occurred.
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www.windenergynetwork.co.uk
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