Jan de Nul’s jackup construction vessel Vol de Vent is now under way from Halifax, Canada to the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (VCOW) Wind Farm site offshore Virginia Beach to commence installation of two 12 mW windmills:
She left Halifax after receiving the first components from the HLV Bigroll Baufort:
Her ETA at the site 27 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach is 24. May:
Then the first monopile is installed on the CVOW project site:
She will return to Europe on completion of the job, without touching a US port.
Contract for the CTV to be used to service the CVOW during operation has been signed:
What’s the crew size on the CTV? A few crew boat jobs are nice but I’m having a hard time seeing how offshore wind is going to be a boon to the U.S. maritime trade.
Can’t be more than 2 I’d guess.
Maybe you should look again:
And it is not only in the US that the opportunities exists for those who have the technology, vessels and guts to try:
The Offshore wind market in Europe is already big and growing, with more Offshore vessels being engaged. The need for new vessels are also predicted to grow:
i read somewhere not too long ago that Scotland only really got 6% of the numbers of new jobs promised by politicians and wind farm advocates…
Yeah you’re right, article linked below.
The wages are quite good on the big windfarm jack-up vessels and they also have a big crew.
But I think these small CTV vessels typically have a crew of 2-3 people, a Skipper and an AB. The wages are quite poor also, Skippers are on about $30k per year, ABs on around $20k working 2 weeks on 2 weeks off, they are usually tied up alongside at night, some have no accommodation so crew live ashore.
You probably read this article:
But for mariners the job market is worldwide and not tied to one project, or one company.
The number of large SOVs and Construction vessels are growing by the day and all over the world. It stands to reason that those vessels need skilled and experienced marine crews as well as technicians and riggers etc.
i am an ex commercial fisherman,now oil patch guy. in Rhode island and long island nearby where i grew up fishing there is big push back from local fisherman, the politicians are promising tens of thousands of new jobs created… i dont see it, the units are made overseas, the construction vessels are foriegn flagged, its just more typical BS from politicians in the rush to be labeled forward thinking.just like the wind companies are in a huge rush to get at the free money in form of subsidies from the feds… and rate and tax payers will pay for it all in form of higher rates…
I’ve heard heard that some of these windfarm jack-ups can be hard to sleep on as when they are pilling the foundations into the ground the shock-waves reverberate through the whole vessel. Obviously not a problem with suction piles. Some countries with strong unions like Australia might not allow crew to sleep on ships if the noise is too much, they’d probably have to have a floatel vessel nearby where crew weren’t affected by noise but transferred onto the jack-up vessel for piling.
Looks like a typical dichotomy - politicians and industry cheerleading publications using words like “bonanza” and “opportunity” while reality (if such a thing is possible in today’s media) reports much lower results.
Are those “large SOVs and Construction vessels” paying US (or Scottish) - level wages and benefits?
It’s not very scientific, but looking on LinkedIn around 90% of Jan De Nul employed seafarers (on LinkedIn at least) seem to be from Croatia, I think Croatian wages are generally a bit less than UK wages which in turn seem to be a lot less than US wages.
I don’t know if there are any set pay scale for all SOVs and/or Construction vessels. It is probably dependent on availability of suitably skilled and experienced personnel.In some cases also on the flag state and area of operation.
Yes that is true, since there are no US built and flagged Wind Farm Construction vessels in existence. Nor are there any efficient cable laying vessels that can compete with the European ones:
https://www.vanoord.com/activities/cable-laying-vessel
BTW; the same goes for SOVs. Here may be an explanation why not_
Subsea 7 subsidiary Seaway Offshore Cables are working on the infield cable contract for Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind as we speak:
First and foremost, said Mr Truelock, vessels would need to be built in the US to comply with the requirements of the Jones Act, but designs could not simply be imported from Europe without significant changes. European vessels might meet IMO requirements he said, but for the US market they would need to meet the requirements of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFRs), including the Title 46 CFR, the portion of the code that governs a number of vessel types built in the US. They would also probably need to meet the requirements of Subchapter L for offshore vessels.
It’s strange how they can’t just import European designs if needed, what major differences could there be with those US regulations?
I’ve seen some US built OSVs and one thing I noticed was they had noticeably less portholes than most vessels I’d seen before of similar size, there must be a lot of cabins with no natural light.
the way its being sold to the public is that it will create tens of thousands of new high paying jobs, this is simply not so. i get it they have to use foriegn ships and workers to build the fields, we dont have suitable equipment here in the states, but the long term jobs are not gonna be there. i applied for the service boat job driving the cool little service boat around the Block Island farm, only to be told my license is too big, they dont want any DP guys, they want to pay 6 pack captains 15$ an hour and do it part time… it same old political wind, they admit the rates for power will go up, the contracts to buy the power are way higher than market price, but they count on public stupidity to not ask real questions…
But hey…it’s shovel ready…
You are looking for a job NOW, not in the future.
If anybody promised “tens of thousands of jobs” from 5 windmills, they are full of sh*t.
When you get a few hundred of them standing off your coast the jobs (and the US.-built boats) will come.
Maybe not “tens of thousands”, before there are a thousand windmills on and offshore.
Not so many jobs for mariners, but even a few hundred job, (spread on both coasts) would come in handy, would it not?
IOW; jobs for the future. (For those who are willing to adapt, gain the skills and experience required)
Weren’t American built Vard designs hugely popular in the last GoM boom? I wonder how tailor made those designs were for the US market. Container ships especially get flagged in and out of the US constantly without major modifications as well.