Page 13: of Offshore Engineer Magazine (May/Jun 2023)

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FLOATING WIND INTERVIEW WITH ACTEON CCO BARRY PARSONS

Deploying both geophysical survey with geotechnical acquisition is a customer-driven engagement that is designed to drive efciency.

Tink Global, Act Local

The promise of offshore wind is usually wrapped up in the renewable energy/decarbonization discussion that dominates many industries today, but for Acteon and its brethren in the sector, it is a genuine business opportunity. Barry Parsons, CCO, Acteon Group, put the challenge and opportunity in perspective, with insight on how Acteon’s next-generation technology development today can help.

“We already mentioned it, but the notion of supply chain complexity, particularly at the scale, is a challenge.”

He said Acteon is engaged in discussions with one client that has a foating wind project with 200 turbines. “If you fgure 200 turbines, with four mooring legs per turbine, you’re talking about 800 anchors in a single project installed over a few seasons,” said Parsons.” That’s years and years of anchor installations for oil and gas, and we’re going to do this in one project. Just think about the amount of chain and anchors, and never mind all the hulls at quayside, and the complexity of managing it all; it’s going to be enormous.”

This challenge brings opportunity, particularly with the global spread of projects. While traditionally the equipment for the project would be manufactured far from the project and shipped in, “I think, driven in part by our regulators, but also in part by practical economics, it’s going to make a lot of sense to fabricate more of this equipment closer to where the project is being installed,” said Parsons. “This generates a lot of local value in the local community. This is not terribly complicated to fabricate, but there’s a lot of it. So doing it locally is a real opportunity.”

MAY/JUNE 2023 OFFSHORE ENGINEER 13