Page 9: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (January 2021)

some 60 ? oating wind substructure con- port cable manufacturing and instal- spection of large numbers of in-water cepts. Of these 60, 38 have been tank lation capacity is another challenge to components and where the question tested and 20 scale tested in the ? eld address, especially the manufacture of of in-situ (? oating-to-? oating) versus and 3 concepts have been demonstrated above 66kV dynamic export cables, he tow-to-port repair and maintenance pro- at full scale. says. And ? nally, Lewis says, the in- grams is to be addressed.

“Only 2 concepts have reached the stage of pilot array to date, although sev- eral more concepts will reach this stage over the next couple of years. We expect to see the ? rst pre-commercial arrays - that’s under 100MW by 2022 - and the ? rst commercial arrays over 100MW by the middle of the decade,” Lewis says.

Challenges

With any opportunities, invariably, there are challenges. What has been touted as a bene? t earlier in the article – bigger size – can also pose a challenge.

“Firstly, I think most people would struggle to picture how big these units can be. If we take an industrial-scale ? oating wind farm, you could easily ex- pect to see 50 to 100 steel or concrete or substructures to meet a 200-300 day

T echnical installation weather window.

Taking the example of a steel ? oater,

Lewis explains, that could be 150,000 to competence 350,000 tonnes of steel to be produced in two to three years, with each 2500- 3500 tonnes structure requiring some 6,000+sqm of area.

“The structures are physically large and will be required in large quantities,”

Lewis says.

Service with passion

Furthermore, in addition to waterside laydown areas, there will be a need for

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MAN PrimeServ as a strong service solution provider ings, and hook-up systems.

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“There is a speci? c challenge to adapt 7RÀQGRXWPRUHDERXWRXUWHFKQLFDOFRPSHWHQFH offshore oil & gas mooring solutions please visit: to ? oating wind – addressing weight, quantity, and footprint of the anchors www.man-es.com and mooring lines,” Lewis explains.

Dynamic array and high voltage ex- www.marinelink.com 9

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