Wind power |
JAVELIN anchor: how floating wind could benefit from deep thinking
Deployment of floating offshore wind at scale entails significant challenges. Addressing these complexities requires innovative solutions and strong partnerships — such as the collaboration between Reflex Marine and MintMech. Here, the two companies discuss developing the novel JAVELIN anchor system, and how it could set new standards for mooring technology
Floating offshore wind uses floating platforms anchored to the seabed, enabling deployment in deeper waters where fixed-bottom turbines are not feasible, thus accessing stronger and more consistent wind resources. This presents a mooring and anchoring challenge.
The ideal mooring solution depends on a range of factors including turbine foundation design, metocean conditions, water depth and seabed characteristics. For example, while stronger or more consistent winds might be favourable for power generation, an offshore installation exploiting them would subsequently have to withstand greater forces. Also, as more installations are deployed and prime sites are developed, it may be necessary to install windfarms in areas with difficult ground conditions.
A FLOW (floating offshore wind) farm might require hundreds of anchors, because each turbine often needs multiple anchors to withstand 1 in 50 or 1 in 100 year storms and to comply with the requirements of insurance providers. In addition, the mooring technology must be economically viable at scale, deployable rapidly and able to withstand the loads of the mooring
lines for the project’s lifetime.
The industry’s traditional solutions, such as drag embedment, suction pile or driven pile anchors, have predominantly been developed in the oil and gas market, where risks and requirements differ. Consequently, they can be suboptimal choices for floating offshore wind.
Enter JAVELIN
JAVELIN is a slender, deep embedment anchoring solution suitable for a range of geologies, water depths and design loads. Developed by offshore crew and cargo transfer specialist, Reflex Marine, the JAVELIN Lower Anchor (JLA) accesses the more competent strata found at greater depths in the seabed. The JLA can be locked in place with either a conventional cement grout bond or a novel aggregate locking system, which grips the sediment in a similar way to a wall-plug. “The shape of the components and novel locking mechanism of the JLA generates hoop stress,” notes Luke Anstice, geotechnical engineer at Reflex Marine, “so that the more load that’s applied to the anchor, the stronger the bond to the surrounding stratum, even in very weak, highly fractured ground.”
The JAVELIN anchor concept
-10m -20m -30m -40m -50m -60m -70m -80m -90m -100m
anchors Drag
Dynamically installed anchors
SEPLA
Suction pile
Driven pile
Each collar moves a little, transferring horizontal loads into the geology
Maximum angle ±40°
“While still in development, the novel aggregate locking system has the potential to make installation almost instant,” said Alun Jones, contracts manager at Reflex Marine. “If you have 50 turbines and 250 anchors to deploy, such savings on vessel costs and installation time can be significant.” JAVELIN is designed to be installed at depths of as much as 100 m below the seabed, around twice as deep as traditional driven or suction piles. By accessing the stronger geology at greater depths, it’s possible to reduce the diameter of steel involved. Crucially, this means that boreholes are much faster to drill compared to large diameter solutions and the anchors can be installed using simple drilling techniques from a variety of suitable vessels.
anchor
The JAVELIN anchor compared with other mooring concepts for floating offshore wind. Source of images: Reflex Marine/MintMech
36 | June 2025|
www.modernpowersystems.com
“The slender nature of the JAVELIN anchor means you can handle it in the same way as a section of drill string,” says Laurie Thornton, director at MintMech, a specialist engineer experienced in offshore technologies. “With some simple, retrofittable upgrades, many vessels can both drill the borehole and install the anchor, eliminating the need for costly, dedicated deployment systems.”
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