Lalrp.org:
September 26, 2023 at 6:30 a.m. EDT
In contrast to 99 p.c of the world’s offshore wind generators, that are fastened on to the ocean ground in comparatively shallow depths, these next-generation machines could be deployed in very deep water, within the outer reaches of ocean house, the place they will harvest extra highly effective, constant wind.
Far offshore, they could additionally keep away from opposition from shoreside communities, who don’t need inexperienced power to spoil the view.
The query of make the whales, fishing fleets and cargo freighters joyful is ongoing.
About 90 miles off the coast, in one of many windiest locations on Earth, the helicopters took a gradual loop previous Norway’s latest wind farm, dubbed Hywind Tampen, constructed by state-owned power big Equinor.
The machines, from afar, seem like pinwheels. However up shut, they’re monumental: every nearly as tall because the Eiffel Tower, above and beneath the waterline, and weighing 12,000 tons, equal to 60 Boeing 747s.
They’re held in place by a number of the heftiest chains ever crafted, connected to the ocean ground by “suction anchors” that burrow into the sand — exhaling and inhaling air — like one thing out of a sci-fi novel.
“It’s a miracle that they float,” stated Ole Arild Larsen, supervisor of operations for Hywind Tampen. He was kidding. He’s spent his profession ensuring they do.
He in contrast his firm’s “spar buoy” design to a stoppered bottle of water, semi-submerged within the sea. On this case, the “bottle” is a big hole concrete tube, sealed at each ends and weighted with gravel and water to decrease the middle of gravity and function a counterbalance to maintain the rig upright.
The generators rise, dip and sway within the swell. They’re slim, elegant and a bit scary.
As we handed, the sweeping blades — every 265 ft lengthy — seemed to be rotating slowly, purposefully, within the gentle air. However seems could be deceiving: The blades journey at 180 mph. A single flip offers sufficient electrical energy to energy one Norwegian home for a day. The blades rotate 10 to fifteen instances a minute; there are 1,440 minutes in a day, 525,600 minutes in a 12 months …
This floating wind farm gained’t provide electrical energy to shore however as an alternative will present 35 p.c of the annual electrical energy energy demand — about 88 megawatts — for 5 offshore oil platforms, which use massive quantities of power to separate oil, gasoline and water from the wells.
So, sure, Hywind Tampen is supporting a grimy trade — one which has been profitable for Norway, serving to to develop a sovereign wealth fund value $1.4 trillion, at a value to the local weather.
The 11 new generators will scale back the nation’s total emissions this 12 months solely barely, by 0.4 p.c. Norway would wish a number of thousand generators within the North Sea to succeed in its local weather pledge of web zero carbon emissions by mid-century.
However officers say floating wind farms are a necessary, revolutionary step in an power transition.
The helicopters landed on Platform C within the Gullfaks oil and gasoline discipline. Just a few miles away, turbine blades scythed via the haze. Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Retailer seemed out and stated he appreciated the symbolism of the juxtaposition.
“The identical engineers who constructed this,” Retailer advised The Washington Submit, pointing to the oil platform upon which we stood, “constructed that.” He pointed towards the wind farm. “We’re happy with that,” he stated.
He predicted that the world will proceed to want oil and gasoline within the a long time to return. “However the oil platforms will come down,” he stated, because the wind trade advances in methods beforehand thought unimaginable — helped by the switch of know-how and know-how from the exploitation of offshore oil and gasoline.
Retailer added that when he has spoken with President Biden, “that is what we discuss … ocean wind.”
When the world’s first offshore wind farm, Vindeby in Denmark, was in-built 1991, few believed it was sensible — and even attainable — to function wind generators offshore. The circumstances have been too harsh.
Vindeby sat only one mile offshore in 12 ft of water. Right now, the “techno-economic restrict” for wind generators fastened to the ocean ground is about 160 ft.
However power corporations have drawn detailed maps to point out the place the worldwide winds are greatest. They discovered that 80 p.c of the world’s offshore wind potential lies in waters deeper than 200 ft, in keeping with the World Wind Power Council, an trade group.
Deeper water is the place the wind is.
The know-how to seize that wind continues to be younger. There are half a dozen totally different designs in circulation for the way greatest to drift wind generators. The prices are excessive, economics unsure, authorities assist tentative.
Earlier than the Hywind Tampen generators have been put in this summer time, there have been solely three floating wind farms on the planet that offered business energy — one in Portugal and two in Scotland. A handful of prototypes have additionally been deployed.
However power corporations see the deeper offshore atmosphere as infinitely exploitable.
Mads Nipper, chief government of Danish wind developer Orsted, says it might be attainable to develop floating wind initiatives in waters 1,000 meters deep — about 3,280 ft, or greater than half a mile down.
Kjetil Hove, Equinor’s head of exploration and manufacturing in Norway, imagines hundreds of floating generators constructed across the globe within the coming years.
In a latest multibillion-dollar public sale to lease the waters off Scotland to wind farmers, greater than half have been set to be floating initiatives. Floating parks could also be on their method to South Korea, Chile, Japan, Vietnam and the west coast of the USA.
“This is not going to be a simple job,” Hove cautioned.
The development and operation of floating offshore wind initiatives are advanced — and costly.
Hywind Tampen was initially estimated to price $500 million. However prices soared to $7oo million. The delays and overruns, the corporate stated, have been attributable to inflation, plus provide chain hurdles, particularly for metal — challenges worsened by the pandemic and fallout from the warfare in Ukraine. The Norwegian authorities closely backed the undertaking.
Every of the machines was constructed dockside, in a deep-water harbor. They have been then towed out to sea and tethered to the large suction anchors. It takes 19 shared anchors to carry down the 11 wind generators, connected with chains heavy sufficient to safe a battleship.
With greater winds come more-challenging circumstances.
Seas of 20 ft — the peak of a two-story constructing — usually are not unusual right here. So are winds in extra of 40 mph. These generators can not search shelter in a protected harbor. They can’t run for it.
Refined software program helps “pilot” the machines. It could alter the pitch of the blades and the way they face the wind, to maintain the generators upright and balanced — and battle the forces of sea and storm, the yaw, pitch, roll, sway, surge and heave.
When flying previous the wind park — or with digital camera lens from the oil platform — one can see the floating generators not solely rise and fall within the waves but additionally tilt, leaning into the wind. More durable to see with the human eye, the machines can even drift a bit, like an anchored boat.
You can not land a helicopter on high of a wind turbine. There’s no room. You possibly can dangle a employee, should you actually wanted to. However you don’t wish to. As a substitute, the upkeep groups come by boat and scramble up ladders.
Larsen stated the machines routinely flip themselves off in excessive winds. However they need to climate the storms alone.
The fishing and delivery communities are cautious of the approaching age of offshore wind — the prospect of hundreds of machines in deep seas.
So, too, are environmentalists, who assist renewable power however wish to be assured that the deep ocean generators usually are not harming whales, fish and birds.
Critics of standard wind farms usually complain about noise — the low jet-engine idling sounds they make — and the look of them.
Proponents of floating offshore wind say the generators will definitely be unheard, and principally invisible, to date off the coast. However they agree they should accommodate delivery lanes, fishing grounds and chicken migration routes.
On the Gullfaks oil rig, Norway’s Crown Prince Haakon carried out the ceremonial stunt, connecting two electrical cables to have fun the opening of the wind farm. Employees on the rig waved Norwegian flags.
Requested about it afterward, the oilmen and girls stated they welcomed the brand new know-how and the roles it’ll convey. It was gorgeous, they stated, that the North Sea may transition from fossil fuels to wind inside their lifetimes.
