| Work Detail |
French energy major TotalEnergies has launched a pilot project consisting of a floating wind turbine to supply renewable power to the Culzean offshore platform in the UK North Sea.
The 3MW floating wind turbine will be located two kilometres west of the Culzean platform, 220 km off the eastern coast of Scotland. The turbine, expected to be fully operational by the end of 2025, will supply around 20% of the platform’s power requirement and reduce its GHG emissions.
TotalEnergies stated that the turbine would be installed on a modular, light semi-submersible floater hull designed by Ocergy.
“This innovative pilot project aims at proving the concept of hybridization of power generation on an offshore facility, by integrating the generation of renewable electricity from a floating wind turbine with the existing power generation from gas turbines. It also aims at qualifying a promising floater design for the future of floating offshore wind”, said Marie-Noelle Semeria, chief technology officer at TotalEnergies.
This pilot project was selected in Crown Estate Scotland’s Innovation and Targeted Oil & Gas leasing round, designed to support the use of offshore wind energy to supply offshore oil & gas platforms directly.
Culzean has reserves estimated between 250m and 300m barrels of oil equivalent, making it the largest gas project developed in the United Kingdom in the last 25 years. Production started in June 2019 and should meet 5% of the United Kingdom’s gas demand, bringing to 18% of the country’s gas demand supplied by TotalEnergies.
Archer Wind, Archer’s floating offshore wind solutions provider, was awarded work by TotalEnergies on the floating wind foundation for the Culzean pilot project.
The company has already started with detailed engineering and engaging key fabrication and assembly subcontractors to ensure the timely execution of the project. |
