Innovation Exchange challenge: Solutions for the Anchor Monitoring, Focussing on Anchor Slippage

Background

The iX initiative is supporting the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult Floating Offshore Wind Centre of Excellence (FWCoE) and its 18 member companies (the Challenge holder) in the offshore wind industry to identify solutions to its innovation needs.

Floating offshore wind

Through the ScotWind leasing round, the UK recently committed to as much as 27.6GW (approximately 1500-3000 turbines) of new offshore wind generating capacity over the next decade, of which 19GW will be built on floating foundations. The recent Innovation and Targeted Oil and Gas (INTOG) leasing round has extended this capacity by 5.4GW, bringing the total Scottish floating wind pipeline capacity to 24.4GW. Celtic Sea leasing will provide an additional 4GW of floating wind capacity in England and Wales. Globally, the floating offshore wind market is expected to grow to 264GW of installed capacity by 2050 (DNV, 2023[1]).

ORE Catapult Floating Offshore Wind Centre of Excellence

The Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult is the UK’s leading innovation centre for offshore wind. ORE Catapult’s unique facilities, research and engineering capabilities bring together industry and academia and drive innovation.

ORE Catapult has established the Floating Offshore Wind Centre of Excellence (FOW CoE) to develop an internationally recognised initiative to reduce the cost of energy from floating wind and hosts memberships to 19 offshore wind developers. The Centre will accelerate the build-out of floating farms, create opportunities for the UK supply chain, and drive innovations in manufacturing, installation and O&M.

Floating offshore wind turbine mooring systems and this challenge

Mooring systems for floating offshore wind turbines (FOWT) are typically designed with lines that tether the floating structure to the seabed. One design approach with mooring systems for FOWTs is the application of a 3-leg mooring system. FOWT structures are unmanned so during severe environmental loading conditions, and in the event of a failure, unacceptable consequences such as loss of life or environmental effects are avoided.
If a mooring line fails, the remaining two lines would provide sufficient holding capacity to avoid collision with another structure. Therefore, the added material and installation costs of a 3-line system are absorbed to reduce the risk of catastrophic failure. Upon mooring line failure, the FOWT can experience a significant offset in the opposite direction to the broken line, which may compromise the position of the remaining two anchors. Therefore, it is important that the position of these anchors are tracked.

Eligibility

Entrants to this competition must be:

• Established businesses, startups, SMEs or individual entrepreneurs
• UK based or have the intention to set up a UK base

Rewards & Benefits

Successful applicants will be given an opportunity to pitch to the Challenge Holder. At the discretion of the organisers of the competition, the package may also include:

• Support from the ORE Catapult or the Innovate UK Business Connect
• Support in the development of a prototype or pilot
• Technical support
• A place in Innovate UK Business Connect or ORE Catapult events
• A potential business collaboration
• Investor introductions (if investment is required)

For more details, and functional and technical requirements, visit the Innovation Exchange site at the link below.