BOEM takes first step toward California offshore wind lease

Maritime News
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this sounds pretty good to me and right in John’s own backyard! Tell you what John, let’s get our hands on a few newer DP OSVs and set up a windfarm installation and maintenance company. Whattya say partner?

[B]BOEM takes first step toward California offshore wind lease[/B]


Principle Power’s WindFloat is one of two floating support structures eyed for Morro Bay project

MARCH 21, 2016 — The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has taken its first step toward potential leasing for commercial wind energy development in federal waters offshore California.

The agency has completed an initial review of an unsolicited lease request from Trident Winds, LLC (Trident Winds) for a floating wind energy project offshore Morro Bay, CA, deemed the request complete, and will soon issue a Federal Register Notice to determine if there is competitive interest in the area.

“Today’s announcement marks an important step in facilitating the responsible development of clean offshore energy to power homes and businesses in the Golden State,” said BOEM Director Abigail Ross Hopper. “BOEM will work closely with the state of California, industry and a broad range of stakeholders to ensure that our leasing process is conducted in a thoughtful, engaged, and transparent manner.”

As part of its review, BOEM confirmed that Trident Winds is legally, technically, and financially qualified to hold an offshore wind energy lease in federal waters. BOEM’s receipt of an unsolicited lease request is the first step in a leasing process that will include environmental analysis and extensive stakeholder engagement.

The Trident Winds request, received on January 14, 2016, is the first formal interest in obtaining a lease for wind development in federal waters off California.The proposed a project would generate up to 800 megawatts (MW) of power using about 100 floating foundations, each supporting a turbine that could produce up to 8 MW. A single seafloor transmission cable would bring the electricity to shore. The proposal may be expanded to generate 1,000 MW at a later date, if additional transmission capacity and market off-take can be obtained.

The project would be located about 33 nautical miles northwest of Morro Bay in water depths of 2,600‐3,300 feet. The proposed lease area is 67,963 acres.

Floating turbine platforms anchored to the seafloor, as proposed by Trident Winds, offer an alternate technology for generating wind power in the deeper waters off the Pacific coast.

Trident Winds notes that Siemens and MHI-Vestas have commercially available 7 MW and 8 MW offshore wind turbine generators (OWTG)s, respectively and that two floating support structures, Statoil’s Hywind and Principle Power’s WindFloat, are expected to be available for commercial use at the time of the project construction, now estimated to be in the 2022 time-frame.

Trident Winds says that either the Hywind or the WindFloat floating support structure is suitable for the deployment in the Morro Bay Project.

“As California moves forward to meet 50 percent of the state’s energy needs with clean, renewable energy by 2030, wind power will play an important role,” said Commissioner David Hochschild of the California Energy Commission. “This offshore wind project proposal, the first of its kind, marks another important milestone.”

The next step in BOEM’s process is to publish a Federal Register Notice to determine if there is competitive interest in the area requested. The Notice also requests the public and interested stakeholders to comment and provide information on site conditions, commercial, military or other uses of the area and potential impacts of the proposed Trident Winds project. BOEM expects to issue the Notice this summer.

BOEM will use the information and expressions of interest received during the comment period to determine whether there is competitive interest in the area. If BOEM determines there is competitive interest, it will initiate the competitive leasing process. If no expressions of interest are received, BOEM will proceed with the noncompetitive leasing process. BOEM will also use responses to the Notice to inform decision-making about the proposed project and to identify potential issues for National Environmental Policy Act analysis.

To date, BOEM has awarded eleven commercial wind energy leases in federal waters off the Atlantic coast, including nine leases issued as a result of competitive lease sales (two leases in an area offshore Rhode Island-Massachusetts, two offshore Massachusetts, two offshore New Jersey, two offshore Maryland, and one offshore Virginia). Competitive lease sales generated $16.4 million in winning bids for more than a million acres in federal waters.

A copy of Trident Winds unsolicited lease request and additional information on the BOEM wind energy leasing process, can be viewed HERE

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good idea, but bayoo mafia will get no-bid Contracts

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[QUOTE=z-drive;181699]good idea, but bayoo mafia will get no-bid Contracts[/QUOTE]
I can see them self destructing eventually. After a series of catrostrophic accidents and class action lawsuits. It’s gotta happen at some point

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I ran into an old friend of mine when I was travelling overseas. He said he was working as C/M on an offshore wind platform or something of the sort in Europe.

Does that mean some of those things are manned? I looked them up afterwards to see if there’s any chance of something like that coming to the U.S. and it didn’t seem that they are actually manned.

Anyone know anything about this offshore wind stuff? He said it was the same schedule as when he worked on an FPSO, 30 days on, 30 days off. I have never worked that schedule but have always thought it would be nice.

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33 miles nw of morro bay…no shortage of wind there…

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Oh man sounds like I need to look into that special 6000itc Chief offshore wind farm support vessel license. I hope OMSA and the CG can grandfather me in.

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Annual inspections and periodic service required - equipment and structure. Island Offshore has been doing this, as well as the new ECO X-Bow is being outfitted with Uptime gangway and currently being marketed. HOS Achiever had same type gangway for accommodation contract with BP Thunderhorse. Sorry Fraqrat - Unlimited license required for these vessels

IMG_0661-versjon-2.jpg1224×1007

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So they have special wind turbine technicians that fly in or stay with the boats or something?

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[QUOTE=Fraqrat;181711]Oh man sounds like I need to look into that special 6000itc Chief offshore wind farm support vessel license. I hope OMSA and the CG can grandfather me in.[/QUOTE]

sorry, West Coast residents only*

AND NOBODY’S GONNA BE SPITTING IN NO FUCKIN WATER BOTTLES, COKE CANS OR FUCKIN PAPER CUPS WITH PAPER TOWELS IN THEM NEITHER!

unless you wanna dip pot and then it’s ok

*weren’t you fixin to relocate out here to Man’s Country anyway? Down Oregon way if I am not mistaken. We’re lookin for a few good engineers who actually can fix shit. You might have a place in our operation.

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[QUOTE=cajaya;181715]So they have special wind turbine technicians that fly in or stay with the boats or something?[/QUOTE]

Usually have technicians in rotation on the vessel (not part of vessel crew). Sometime abseilers are brought out for inspection and sometimes use drones for inspection (although in California, if the drone crashes and eaten by a whale, and the whale dies, you are in serious trouble; it’s probably better for the abseiler to fall and be eaten by a Great White - less paperwork and no picketing)

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[QUOTE=c.captain;181716]sorry, West Coast residents only*

*weren’t you fixin to relocate out here to Man’s Country anyway? Down Oregon way if I am not mistaken. We’re lookin for a few good engineers who actually can fix shit. You might have a place in our operation.[/QUOTE]

sign me up. I’ll be chief fraq’s oiler…or maybe the new trade restricted oiler endorsement for the windfarm may be called blower instead.

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[QUOTE=anchorman;181718] Sometime abseilers are brought out for inspection and sometimes use drones for inspection (although in California, if the drone crashes and eaten by a whale, and the whale dies, you are in serious trouble; it’s probably better for the abseiler to fall and be eaten by a Great White - less paperwork and no picketing)[/QUOTE]

That is so funny…sad thing is I could see a course of events like that happening here…

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We will be moving to the Vancouver area more specifically Hazel Dell. Only thing that stopped us recently is we wanted the kids to be a little older. If something happened to my wife while I'm at work my kids would end up in some rapey foster home. I wanted my son to be at least 18 where he could get custody of his little sisters until I could get home.

Who says those vessels need unlimited licenses? They are engaged in offshore exploitation of a natural resource. Besides if they’re gonna be existing OSV’s they won’t be Union so the UL deep sea guys won’t go near it.

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[QUOTE=Fraqrat;181722]

Who says those vessels need unlimited licenses? They are engaged in offshore exploitation of a natural resource. Besides if they’re gonna be existing OSV’s they won’t be Union so the UL deep sea guys won’t go near it.[/QUOTE]

I was conveying vessels with existing capability that are currently available and being marketed. Not necessarily predicting, just stating the fact those vessels are unlimited.

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The one they built off RI didn’t have any fancy boats just Cajun tugs and barges

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[QUOTE=z-drive;181726]The one they built off RI didn’t have any fancy boats just Cajun tugs and barges[/QUOTE]

that’s Rhode Island which offshore is shallow and mostly calm

off of California, there are swells fetching from thousands of miles away and the water is DAMNED DEEP!

cajuns, coonasses, swampmen and flag waiving Confederates have no place there

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it’s exposed and never calm save a few weeks in summer. But it is shallow, isn’t that the idea to have them in shallow water anyways?

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Windfarm construction and servicing is big business in NW Europe, but presently in shallow waters and bottom supported.
Statoil has had a floating windmill in deeper water for test for some years and are now investing in a pilot project off Scotland.
The latest innovation is to incorporate battery storage for continuity: http://www.statoil.com/en/NewsAndMedia/News/2016/Pages/21mar-batwind.aspx

There are a number of Lift Boats used to assemble the wind turbines. Here is one: http://worldmaritimenews.com/archives/66317/seafox-5-heads-for-vilssingen-after-delivery/
(I loaded this one on the Blue Marlin for transport to Rotterdam in 2012)

A lot of vessels similar to OSVs are used to service them. Some are purpose built, others just OSVs with additional equipment.
Here is a very special design from Ulstein: http://ulstein.com/innovations/twin-x-stern

Accommodation vessel to house personnel and Crew boats to bring them to/from the wind mills are also big business. (Purpose built, not GOM type CBs)

Here is a link to a website that can tell you all about it: http://www.offshorewind.biz/

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I like the sound of this new music more and more…let’s all dance!

[B]The new California gold rush is in offshore wind[/B]

By Bloomberg News - Jennifer A. Dlouhy

5/17/2016

(Bloomberg) — When turbines start spinning at the first U.S. offshore wind farm near Rhode Island later this year, some energy developers will already be eyeing a bigger prize.

There’s a steadier, harder wind blowing off the California coast. Those reliable Pacific gusts could yield nearly a terawatt of electricity, 13 times the capacity of all the wind turbines now installed on land in the U.S. — without consuming real estate or blocking anyone’s views.

But Mother Nature isn’t going to make it easy. The continental shelf plunges fast and deep off the west coast, making it impossible to install conventional turbines into a seabed hundreds of feet under water. Some developers think they’ve found the solution: harnessing this renewable resource with technology borrowed from the fossil-fuel industry to keep turbines afloat.

“We can’t fix turbines into the ocean floor out there,” said Nancy Sopko, manager of advocacy and federal legislative affairs for the American Wind Energy Association. “To tap into that great offshore wind potential, we’re going to need these floating structures.”

Floating Platforms

The Department of Energy is expected to decide next month whether to award some $40 million to as many as five floating wind projects that have already won previous funding. And the Interior Department will soon ask if there’s commercial interest in leasing Pacific waters near California and Hawaii — a critical step toward future floating wind projects there.

The technology is in its early days. Globally, there are just 15.33 megawatts of floating wind capacity, mostly coming from a handful of pilot projects involving one or two turbines, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. That’s less than a percent of the total 11.6 gigawatts of capacity from traditional wind projects in waters around the world.

Morro Bay

More are on the way. Seattle-based developer Trident Winds LLC is aiming to float some 100 offshore wind systems about 15 miles off the central California coast, near the city of Morro Bay. The project, which would be developed over the next decade, would link up with existing electric infrastructure, funneling power from the turbines to a decommissioned PG&E Corp. power plant.

The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management just completed an initial review of Trident Winds’ request for a lease at the site, which would be the first wind development in federal waters off California. But permitting may take years as it would be subject to reviews by the bureau and at least two state agencies.

Meanwhile, Statoil ASA is taking advantage of its experience designing and building some of the world’s biggest and most complex offshore oil facilities to erect a floating wind farm off the coast of Scotland. The project, expected to go online in 2017, involves five 6-megawatt turbines.

Offshore Wind

The company — Norway’s largest oil producer — hasn’t launched any floating wind ventures in the U.S., but during a recent swing through Washington and New York, a Statoil executive was unabashed in highlighting the opportunity. “We think the U.S. is ripe for offshore wind,” said Irene Rummelhoff, executive vice president of new energy solutions. “We are seeing potential in the Northeast. We love California.”

For wind developers, California has special appeal not just because of the strong gusts buffeting its coast, but also a new law that requires state utilities to derive half of their electricity from wind, solar and other renewable sources by 2030 — up from about 20% now.

Trident Winds Co-Founder Alla Weinstein, a former Honeywell engineer who ran another wind company, Principle Power Inc., until February 2015, said floating projects also can capitalize on lower installation costs than their conventional cousins, which are installed with steel pilings into the sea floor.

Heavy Lift

Traditional offshore turbines must be customized to account for varying water depth and soil conditions. Installing them is a time-consuming task that requires specialized vessels. It took roughly 200 workers four months to install five jacket foundations at a 30-megawatt wind farm near Block Island, Rhode Island. Turbines still need to be put in place before that project can go online as expected later this year.

By contrast, floating wind systems can generally be assembled on shore and then towed to sea where mooring lines are all that’s needed to tether them to the ocean floor.

“I don’t need the boats. I don’t need the cranes. I don’t need the equipment that’s going to cost a lot of money,” Weinstein said. “You just need a simple anchor handling vessel to do all the installation, because everything’s done onshore.”

Statoil’s Rummelhoff envisions cost-effective, mass fabrication of the wind production systems. “Eventually, when this is industrialized, you can imagine just having a factory popping these out, and they’ll all be the same,” she said.

Recycled Foundations

Floating turbine foundations cost about eight times more than seafloor-based supports for their conventional counterparts, according to BNEF. But they can be reused to support replacement turbines when old ones reach the end of their quarter-century lifespan.

“Every 20 or 25 years, no matter what you do, you have to replace the turbine,” said Habib Dagher, executive director of the University of Maine’s Advanced Structures and Composites Center. Since the biggest expenses of offshore wind projects are foundations and associated infrastructure — not the turbines — floating designs that allow reuse of those expensive structures are more cost-effective.

One of floating wind’s other benefits just can’t be seen. Literally. The projects disappear when installed a dozen or more miles from shore, appeasing residents who fret about spinning blades spoiling their ocean views. Such opposition helped topple the Cape Wind project off Massachusetts, and presumed Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump fought the construction of a wind farm near his luxury golf resort in Scotland.

Offshore wind projects aren’t free from environmental criticism. Fishermen and conservationists have warned that some projects could disturb seabirds, marine mammals and fish spawning grounds.

Challenging Costs

But the major challenge is cost. Floating wind could cost around $8.95 million per megawatt by 2020 — more than double the $4.03 million per megawatt projected for conventional offshore, bottom-fixed wind projects — said BNEF analyst Tom Harries.

Those price projections are pegged to small-scale demonstration projects with sometimes a single turbine in the water — even though they shoulder many of the same costs as large wind farms in terms of permitting and infrastructure. A recent Statoil floating project got costs lower — to $7.8 million per megawatt — by using more than one turbine and drawing on lessons learned from an earlier venture, Harries said.

Cost concerns may be throwing off Seattle-based Principle Power Inc.’s plan to install up to five 6-megawatt floating turbines off Coos Bay, Oregon. The so-called WindFloat Pacific project received Energy Department funding but so far hasn’t found willing buyers for the power it would generate after utilities in Oregon said it would be too expensive.

"If floating wind wants to seriously join the offshore party it needs to scale up with more megawatts,” Harries said. “More importantly, it needs to reduce the size and weight of the foundations in order to bring down costs. Otherwise it will remain an expensive experiment.”

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Gearing up to be part of this new and exciting Offshore industry?
Here is a report from EWEA that will give you a good grounding in what is coming and what is required to be part of it: www.ewea.org/fileadmin/files/library/publications/reports/Deep_Water.pdf

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Some more general info and related links found at this page.

http://www.boem.gov/Renewable-Energy-Program/Renewable-Energy-Guide/Offshore-Wind-Energy.aspx