Seagreen Meteorological Mast

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I was invovled as Client representative for SSE on the Seagreen wind farm. The phase of the project I was actively engaged in was the pre-construction installation of a meterorological mast. I was involved in the mobilisation at the famous Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast and then joined the Brave Tern jackup vessel by helicopter from Aberdeen. The operation involved a rather interesting foundation technology. The concept is to use a so called suction bucket to drive the mast into the seabed. This technology is commonly used on smaller structures, for example to fix the end of a mooring chain to the sea floor. However the scale of this structure added new challenges. The suction bucket is designed to be lowered to the sea floor, and once the rim of the bucket is fully sealed against the seabed, powerful pumps are used to remove water from inside the bucket, reducing the pressure within the bucket and driving it into the seabed. After the project I remained onboard the vessel for transit back to Belfast via the north of Scotland and through the Pentland Firth.

Offshore on Kentish Flats

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As part of the Kentish Flats Extension project I was involved in offshore activities onboard the DEME jackup vessel Neptune. The purpose of my trip was to demonstrate the performance of an offshore monopile piling noise mitigation device. The device serves an important purpose by reducing the environmental noise emitted into the ocean during monopile installation. For context, as monopiles have increased in size to accomodate ever increasing wind turbines, the noise generated while driving them into the ground is tremdous. Studies by marine biologists suggest the acousitc shock waves emited into the water are enough to kill sealife in close proximity, cause permenent hearing loss to sea mammals nearby, and disrupt feeding and reproduction habits of those further afield. I was part of the team that developed an air filled sleeve to shroud the monopile during piling, significantly reducing the noise emitted.

The project overall was a success, where the deployment of the system was demonstrated, and the performance was quantified using acoustic transducers.