Image courtesy of OSI Renewables
For many years, offshore wind farms have been characterised by two substructure categories – ‘fixed bottom’ or ‘floating’. This characterisation conveniently segmented the market between those deployed in relatively shallow water, to perhaps 60m, and those accessing wind resources in deeper water.
Compared to floating windfarms in deep water, fixed bottom projects are more straightforward to design, deploy and operate. They proliferated quickly, technology matured and economies of scale were delivered and evolution of larger capacity wind turbines resulted rapid cost reduction giving highly competitive electricity prices for consumers.
Floating technology is more complex – it remains a nascent technology. Test and demonstrator projects deliver proof of concepts ahead of the first commercial scale floating wind farms, led by Green Volt, now in development.
Segmenting by ‘fixed bottom’ versus ‘floating’ enabled the maturity of each to be recognised when awarding government support. Fixed bottom projects typically compete for a lower contracts for difference (CfD) price and floating projects compete for a higher level of state support. Until recently, this worked well and most countries adopted this approach.
Jon Ruszka, Early Opportunities team
”However, with an enormous amount of offshore wind resource located in water depths greater than existing fixed bottom can reach, several companies are developing substructures which are designed to operate in water depths to c150m."
These new technologies aim to be simpler to manufacture, assemble, deploy and operate. The anticipation is that these will deliver an electricity cost from areas with water depths currently considered beyond conventional fixed bottom at least competitive, if not lower than, floating wind while simultaneously delivering a host of additional benefits.
Image courtesy of OSI Renewables – not for reuse or redistribution
The evolution of technology brings new opportunities
The new substructure designs did not fit into the ‘fixed bottom’ or ‘floating’ technology pots in CfD auctions, so developers struggled to base their project design around them. Recognising this and the opportunity presented, in July, the UK Government will launch the next CfD auction (AR8) which will include a new technology pot ‘Other Deepwater Offshore Wind’ (ODOW). This new pot will enable projects planning on using these emerging technology types to compete for CfD support.
”The UK is the first country to implement this. With at least two of the companies developing ODOW compliant substructures being UK based, this not only keeps the UK CfD process relevant to industry evolution, it helps enable the UK to become the first mover in implementing these new technologies."
Beyond electricity price, compared to steel floating semi-sub based substructures – in the target water depth of 60 to c150m – ODOW may present additional benefits. These include, simpler supply chain and risk management, more straightforward port strategies, consenting closer to fixed bottom than floating, easier transport & installation, improved operational performance and better ESG metrics. But, potentially, the greatest prize is higher local content – greater gross value added (GVA) to the UK economy and socio-economics.
Time will tell if the technology will deliver, but with the addition of ODOW to the UK CfD mechanism, developers can now confidently engage with the technology innovators knowing that, if adopted, projects using ODOW can qualify for state support application.
Flotation Energy has focus on delivering windfarms in all ranges of deeper water environments. In parallel to advancing floating offshore wind, the company has also been at the heart of this exciting evolution since the beginning, engaging with and supporting technology innovators. As a result, Flotation Energy has built strong working relationships with innovators and is considered not only a thought-leader, but a trusted advisor within the deep water segment of the offshore wind industry.
