The Anonymous Widower

Further Thoughts On BP’s Successful INTOG Bid

I have been searching the web and I feel BP’s successful INTOG bid may be different.

In 13 Offshore Wind Projects Selected In World’s First Innovation And Targeted Oil & Gas Leasing Round, I decided that BP’s bid, which only was for 50 MW of offshore wind would generate hydrogen and send it to shore through the Forties Pipeline System, which is owned by INEOS.

My reasons for feeling that it would generate hydrogen were as follows.

  • In the wider picture of wind in the North Sea, BP’s proposed 50 MW wind farm is a miniscule one. SSE Renewables’s Dogger Bank wind farm is over a hundred times as large.
  • A cable to the shore and substation for just one 50 MW wind farm would surely be expensive.
  • BP Alternative Energy Investments are also developing a 2.9 GW wind farm some sixty miles to the South.
  • It would probably be bad financial planning to put large and small wind farms so close together.

I still believe for these and other reasons, that there is no reason to believe that the proposed 50 MW wind farm is a traditional wind farm and most likely it will be paired with an appropriately-sized electrolyser producing around twenty tonnes of hydrogen per day.

But instead of being sent ashore by using the Forties Pipeline System, could this hydrogen be sent directly to the coast near Aberdeen, in its own personal hydrogen pipeline?

  • Using a variety of maps, I have estimated the distance at only around twenty miles.
  • With all the experience from BP and their suppliers, there must be a solution for a relatively short hydrogen pipeline.

I also found this scientific paper on ScienceDirect, which is entitled Dedicated Large-Scale Floating Offshore Wind To Hydrogen: Assessing Design Variables In Proposed Typologies, which talks about three different layouts.

  • Centralised Onshore Electrolysis
  • Decentralised Offshore Electrolysis
  • Centralised Offshore Electrolysis

All would appear to be feasible.

There is a lot of information in the scientific paper and it leads me to the conclusion, that hydrogen could be generated offshore and transferred by pipeline to storage on the shore.

The paper shows a design for a submarine hydrogen pipeline and schematics of how to design a system.

I believe that BP’s proposed system could deliver around twenty tonnes of hydrogen per day to the shore.

The system could be as simple as this.

  • A few large floating wind turbines would be positioned offshore, perhaps twenty miles from shore.
  • Perhaps 5 x 10 MW, 4 x 12 MW turbines or 3 x 16 MW could be used. Deciding would be one of those calculations, that combines accountancy, data, engineering and finance, which are great fun.
  • The offshore distance would be carefully chosen, so that complaints about seeing them from the shore would be minimised.
  • The generated electricity would be collected at a floating electrolyser, where hydrogen would be created.
  • The hydrogen would be pumped to the shore.
  • The floating electrolyser could also contain hydrogen storage.

I think there is large scope for innovation.

  • I can imagine drones and helicopters delivering equipment and personnel to service the electrolyser.
  • Underwater hydrogen storage could be developed.
  • A standard system could be developed for rolling out anywhere.
  • It could be placed in the sea, by a steelworks or other large hydrogen user.

In its own right the concept would develop new markets, which is one of the wind farm’s aims.

Could This Be The Route To Create Affordable Hydrogen For All?

BP would be failing their customers, employees and shareholders, if they weren’t developing a zero-carbon alternative to diesel and petrol.

Offshore hydrogen electrolysers strategically placed along the coastline, could provide a reliable hydrogen supply to a that sizeable proportion of the world’s population, who live near to the coast.

Could The Technology Be Adapted To Motorway And Large Service Stations?

This document on the UK Government web site, gives the mileage statistics of lorries (HGVs) and has this sub-heading.

In 2019 lorries travelled 17.4 billion vehicle miles, remaining broadly stable (increasing slightly by 0.3%) compared with 2018.

It breaks this figure down, by the class of road.

  • Motorways – 8.0 – 46 %
  • A Roads – 6.3 – 36 %
  • Rural Minor Roads – 0.9 – 5 %
  • Urban A Roads – 1.5 – 9 %
  • Urban Minor Roads – 0.7 – 4 %

Note that 82 % of HGV mileage is on Motorways or A roads. Anybody, who has ever driven a truck bigger than a Ford Transit over a distance of upwards of fifty miles, knows that trucks and vans regularly need to be fuelled up on the road. And that applies to the drivers too, who also by law must take a break, away from the cab.

Charging an electric truck could be a lengthy business and would require service stations to be connected directly to the nation grid and be fitted with a substantial number of heavy duty chargers.

One thing, that would be difficult with an electric truck, would be a Splash-and-Dash, if a truck was nearing the destination  and needed a small amount of charging to meet delivery schedules.

Because of the distances involved, the driving rules, the often tight schedules and the fast filling, I am convinced that there will be a large proportion of hydrogen-powered trucks and vans on the road and these will need a network of service stations where hydrogen is available.

Look at these overhead view of South Mimms Services, where the M25 and the A1(M) cross to the North of London.

 

I would envisage that at least four 10 MW wind turbines, which have a rotor diameter of around 160-190 metres could be dotted around and inside the site including inside the roundabout.

  • The electrolyser would be slightly smaller than that which would be used at Aberdeen.
  • Perhaps fifteen tons per day of hydrogen could be generated.
  • No hydrogen needed on the site would ever be brought in by truck.
  • Wind-generated electricity could also power the hotels, restaurants and the service station.
  • As the percentage of vehicles running on fossil fuels decreased, the air quality in the area of the service station, should increase.
  • How many people, who lived locally would switch to a hydrogen-powered runabout and fill it up perhaps once a week, when they passed?

Much of the technology needed to add a hydrogen option to a typical large service station has already been developed and some would also be needed to build BP’s 50 MW offshore wind farm with an electrolyser.

 

 

 

 

March 26, 2023 Posted by | Energy, Hydrogen | , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

13 Offshore Wind Projects Selected In World’s First Innovation And Targeted Oil & Gas Leasing Round

The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.

This is the sub-heading.

Crown Estate Scotland has selected 13 out of a total of 19 applications with a combined capacity of around 5.5 GW in the world’s first leasing round designed to enable offshore wind energy to directly supply offshore oil and gas platforms.

This paragraph outlines INTOG (Innovation and Targeted Oil & Gas) and its objectives.

INTOG, which has been designed in response to demand from government and industry to help achieve the targets of the North Sea Transition Sector Deal through decarbonising North Sea oil and gas operations, is also expected to further stimulate innovation in Scotland’s offshore wind sector, create additional supply chain opportunity, assist companies to enter the renewable energy market, and support net-zero ambitions.

This is undoubtedly the most important news of the day.

  • When complete it will generate 5416 MW of electricity.
  • 4068 MW will be used primarily to decarbonise oil and gas platforms with surplus electricity going to the grid.
  • The amount of carbon dioxide released by oil and gas platforms in the North Sea will be reduced.
  • The gas saved by decarbonising oil and gas platforms, will be transported to the shore and used in the UK gas grid.
  • 449 MW will be generated in innovative ways in small wind farms, with a capacity of less than 100 MW.

One of the benefits of INTOG is that the UK will be able to reduce gas imports, which must increase energy security.

This map from this document from the Crown Estate Scotland, shows the INTOG wind farms.

This is a list of the farms.

  • 1 – Bluefloat Energy/Renantis Partnership – Innovation – Commercial – 99.45 MW
  • 2 – Bluefloat Energy/Renantis Partnership – Innovation – Supply Chain – 99.45 MW
  • 3 – Simply Blue Energy (Scotland) – Innovation – Supply Chain – 100 MW
  • 4 – BP Alternative Energy Investments – Innovation – New Markets – 50 MW
  • 5 – ESB Asset Development – Innovation – Cost Reduction – 100 MW
  • 6 – Floatation Energy – Targeted Oil & Gas – 560 MW
  • 7 – Cerulean Winds – Targeted Oil & Gas – 1008 MW
  • 8 – Harbour Energy – Targeted Oil & Gas – 15 MW
  • 9 – Cerulean Winds – Targeted Oil & Gas – 1008 MW
  • 10 – Cerulean Winds – Targeted Oil & Gas – 1008 MW
  • 11 – Floatation Energy – Targeted Oil & Gas – 1350 MW
  • 12 – TotalEnergies – Targeted Oil & Gas – 3 MW
  • 13 – Harbour Energy – Targeted Oil & Gas – 15 MW

Note.

  1. These total up to 5.42 GW.
  2. The five Innovation sites seem to be as close to the coast as is possible.
  3. I thought some Innovation sites would be closer, so supply difficult to reach communities, but they aren’t.
  4. Floatation Energy and Cerulean Winds seemed to have bagged the lion’s share of the Targeted Oil & Gas.
  5. Sites 6 and 7 sit either side of a square area, where Targeted Oil & Gas will be considered. Is that area, the cluster of oil and gas facilities around Forties Unity, shown on the map in this page on the BP web site?
  6. Harbour Energy have secured two 15 MW sites for Targeted Oil & Gas.

These are my thoughts on the various companies.

Bluefloat Energy

Bluefloat Energy has posted this press release on their web site, which is entitled Bluefloat Energy | Renantis Partnership Bid Success For Two 99mw Innovation Projects In Crown Estate Scotland’s INTOG Process.

The press release starts with these three bullet points.

  • BlueFloat Energy | Renantis Partnership offered exclusivity rights to develop its Sinclair and Scaraben floating wind projects north of Fraserburgh – leveraging synergies via its 900MW Broadshore project.
  • The projects seek to trial innovative floating wind technology solutions, kick-starting supply chain growth and job creation in Scotland and providing a ‘stepping-stone’ to the partnership’s ScotWind projects.
  • Bid proposals include the intention to develop a scalable community benefit model – creating a potential blueprint for floating offshore wind in Scotland.

The first three paragraphs expand the bullet points.

The BlueFloat Energy and Renantis Partnership has been offered seabed exclusivity rights to develop two 99MW projects under the innovation arm of Crown Estate Scotland’s INTOG (Innovation and Targeted Oil & Gas) auction process. The auction saw ten projects bid to bring forward the development of small-scale innovation projects.

The Sinclair and Scaraben projects, located north of Fraserburgh and adjacent to the Partnership’s 900MW Broadshore project, seek to trial innovative foundation technologies, associated fabrication works and mooring systems with a view to maximising opportunities for the Scottish supply chain, driving local investment and job creation.

A key element of the bid proposals is the opportunity to test and adapt a community benefit model, governed independently, and directed by the communities in which the schemes will operate, through collaboration with our supply chain and project partners. The model could create a blueprint, shaping the future of community benefit from floating offshore wind throughout the whole of Scotland. This builds on Renantis’ successful track record of deploying similar schemes via its onshore wind farms in Scotland.

Note.

  1. Companies called Sinclair Offshore Wind Farm and Scaraben Offshore Wind Farm were registered a few months ago in Inverness.
  2. I couldn’t find the websites, so I suspect they’re still being created.
  3. These two projects appear to be pathfinders for the 900 MW Broadshore project, with regards to the supply chain and community involvement.

It certainly looks like the partnership are going about the development of these two projects in a professional manner.

BP Alternative Energy Investments

There has been no press release from BP as I write this, so I will have to deduce what BP are planning.

This map from this document from the Crown Estate Scotland, shows the Southern INTOG wind farms.

Note.

  1. Site 4 is the site of BP Alternative Energy Investments’s proposed wind farm.
  2. Sites 6 and 7 could be either side of the cluster of platforms around Forties Unity.

Consider.

  • In the wider picture of wind in the North Sea, BP’s proposed 50 MW wind farm is a miniscule one. SSE Renewables’s Dogger Bank wind farm is over a hundred times as large.
  • A cable to the shore and substation for just one 50 MW wind farm would surely be expensive.
  • BP Alternative Energy Investments are also developing a 2.9 GW wind farm some sixty miles to the South.
  • It would probably be bad financial planning to put large and small wind farms so close together.

For these are other reasons, I believe that there is no reason to believe that the proposed 50 MW wind farm is a traditional wind farm.

But if I’m right about sites 6 and 7 indicating the location the position of Forties Unity, it might open up other possibilities.

This document from INEOS, who own the Forties Pipeline System, explains how the pipeline works.

The Forties Pipeline System (FPS) is an integrated oil and gas transportation and processing system. It is owned and operated by INEOS and utilises more than 500 miles of pipeline to smoothly transport crude oil and gas from more than 80 offshore fields for processing at the Kinneil Terminal. At Kinneil the oil and gas are separated, with the oil returned as Forties Blend to customers at Hound Point or pumped to the Petroineos refinery at Grangemouth.
At the same time the gas goes to our LPG export facilities or is supplied to the INEOS petrochemical plant. FPS transports around 40% of the UK’s oil production supply and brings over 400,000 barrels ashore every day.

In Can The UK Have A Capacity To Create Five GW Of Green Hydrogen?, I said the following.

Ryze Hydrogen are building the Herne Bay electrolyser.

  • It will consume 23 MW of solar and wind power.
  • It will produce ten tonnes of hydrogen per day.

The electrolyser will consume 552 MWh to produce ten tonnes of hydrogen, so creating one tonne of hydrogen needs 55.2 MWh of electricity.

If BP were to pair the wind farm with a  50 MW electrolyser it will produce 21.7 tonnes of hydrogen per day.

Could it be brought to the shore, by linking it by a pipeline to Forties Unity and then using the Forties Pipeline System?

As the category on site 4, is New Markets, are BP and INEOS investigating new markets for hydrogen and hydrogen blends?

  • Some of the latest electrolysers don’t need pure water and can use sea water. This makes them more affordable.
  • Do BP and/or INEOS have the capability to extract the hydrogen as it passes through the Cruden Bay terminal, to provide the hydrogen for Aberdeen’s buses and other users?
  • INEOS and BP probably have some of the best oil and gas engineers in the world.
  • How many other places in the world have an offshore oil or gas field set in a windy sea, where floating wind- turbine/electrolysers could generate hydrogen and send it ashore in an existing pipeline?
  • Several of these offshore oil and gas fields and the pipelines could even be owned by BP or its associates.
  • Remember that hydrogen is the lightest element, so I suspect it could be separated out by using this property.

This BP site, is to me, one of the most interesting of the successful bids.

  • BP probably have a large collection of bonkers ideas, that have been suggested during their long involvement with offshore oil and gas.
  • Some ideas could be even suggested by employees, whose fathers worked for BP fifty years ago. I’ve met a few BP employees, whose father also did.
  • Will the wind farm, be a floating electrolyser at the centre of a cluster of a few large floating turbines?
  • Will each turbine have its own electrolyser and the substation only handle hydrogen?
  • Will the floating electrolyser have hydrogen storage?
  • Have BP got a floating or semi-submersible platform, that could either go to the breakers or be repurposed as the floating electrolyser?
  • Repurposing a previous platform, would make all the right noises.

So many possibilities and so far, no clues as to what will be built have been given.

See also.

Further Thoughts On BP’s Successful INTOG Bid

Cerulean Winds

In What Is INTOG?, I said this about Cerulean Winds.

Cerulean sounds like it could be a sea monster, but it is a shade of blue.

This article on offshoreWind.biz is entitled Cerulean Reveals 6 GW Floating Offshore Wind Bid Under INTOG Leasing Round.

These are the two introductory paragraphs.

Green energy infrastructure developer Cerulean Winds has revealed it will bid for four seabed lease sites with a combined capacity of 6 GW of floating wind to decarbonise the UK’s oil and gas sector under Crown Estate Scotland’s Innovation and Targeted Oil and Gas (INTOG) leasing round.

This scale will remove more emissions quickly, keep costs lower for platform operators and provide the anchor for large-scale North-South offshore transmission, Cerulean Winds said.

Note.

    1. It is privately-funded project, that needs no government subsidy and will cost £30 billion.
    2. It looks like each site will be a hundred turbines.
    3. If they’re the same, they could be 1.5 GW each.
    4. Each site will need £7.5 billion of investment. So it looks like Cerulean have access to a similar magic money tree as Kwasi Kwarteng.

Effectively, they’re building four 1.5 GW power stations in the seas around us to power a large proportion of the oil and gas rigs.

For more on Cerulean Winds’s massive project see Cerulean Winds Is A Different Type Of Wind Energy Company.

So does it mean, that instead of 6 GW, they were only successful at three sites and the other or others were in the six unsuccessful applications?

There is a press release on the Cerulean Winds web site, which is entitled Cerulean Winds Wins Bid For Three INTOG Floating Wind Sites, where this is said.

Cerulean Winds and Frontier Power International have been awarded three lease options for the Central North Sea in the highly competitive INTOG leasing round, the results of which were announced by Crown Estate Scotland today.

The sites, in the Central North Sea, will enable the green infrastructure developer and its partners to develop large floating offshore windfarms to decarbonise oil and gas assets. The scale of the development will enable a UK wide offshore transmission system, that can offer green energy to offshore assets in any location and create a beneficial export opportunity.

Nothing about unsuccessful applications was said.

This map from this document from the Crown Estate Scotland, shows the Southern INTOG wind farms.

Note.

  1. Sites 7, 9 and 10 are Cerulean’s sites.
  2. Sites 6 and 11 are Floatation Energy’s sites.
  3. Site 4 is BP Alternative Energy Investments’s Innovation site.
  4. Sites 8, 12 and 13 are much smaller sites.

It looks like Cerulean and Floatation Energy are well-placed to power a sizeable proportion of the platforms in the area.

ESB Asset Development

ESB Asset Development appear to be a subsidiary of ESB Group.

The ESB Group is described like this in the first paragraph of their Wikipedia entry.

The Electricity Supply Board is a state owned (95%; the rest are owned by employees) electricity company operating in the Republic of Ireland. While historically a monopoly, the ESB now operates as a commercial semi-state concern in a “liberalised” and competitive market. It is a statutory corporation whose members are appointed by the Government of Ireland.

This press release, is entitled ESB Offered Exclusive Rights To Develop Innovative 100MW Floating Offshore Wind Project In The Malin Sea.

These two paragraphs outline the project.

ESB today welcomes the outcome of Crown Estate Scotland’s latest seabed leasing process which has resulted in the offer of exclusive development rights to ESB for a 100MW floating wind project in Scottish waters off the north coast of Northern Ireland. The successful project, Malin Sea Wind, is a collaborative bid between ESB and leading technology developers Dublin Offshore Technology and Belfast-based CATAGEN. The outcome underscores ESB’s growing capabilities and expanding presence in the offshore wind industry.

The Innovation and Targeted Oil and Gas (INTOG) seabed leasing process, run by Crown Estate Scotland, aims to drive cost reduction in the offshore wind sector by enabling the deployment of new and innovative technologies, and to harness wind energy to decarbonize the oil and gas sector. Malin Sea Wind aims to support the reduction of floating offshore wind costs by demonstrating Dublin Offshore’s patented load-reduction technology. Furthermore, the project will support decarbonisation of the aviation sector by powering sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production technology currently under development by net-zero technology specialists, CATAGEN.

Note.

  1. I’ve just looked at the Technology page of the Dublin Offshore Technology web site.
  2. In the 1970s, I built large numbers of mathematical models of steel, concrete and water cylinders in my work with a Cambridge University spin-out called Balaena Structures.
  3. I believe, that an experienced mathematically modeller could simulate this clever system.

That would prove if it works or not!

This Google Map shows the Malin Sea.

Note.

  1. Malin Head is marked by the red arrows on the Northern Irish coast.
  2. The most Westerly Scottish island is Islay and the most Easterly is the Isle of Arran.
  3. Between the two islands is the Kintyre peninsula.
  4. Portrush can be picked out on the Northern Irish coast.

By overlaying the two maps, I suspect the centroid of the wind farm will be North of Portrush about a few miles North of the Southern end of Arran.

I suspect that if all goes well, there could be a lot of floating wind turbines in the area.

This Google Map shows the River Foyle estuary and Foyle Port to the North-East of Londonderry/Derry.

Note.

  1. Coolkeeragh ESB and Lisahally biomas power station on the South bank of the River Foyle.
  2. Lisahally biomas power station has a capacity of 16 MW.
  3. There appears to be a large substation at Coolkeeragh ESB.
  4. A tanker of some sort seems to be discharging.

Until told, I’ve guessed wrong, it looks to me like Coolkeeragh ESB could be the destination for the electricity generated by Malin Sea Wind. Given that this project’s aim is cost reduction, a 100 MW wind farm could make a difference.

In addition could Foyle Port be used to assemble and maintain the floating turbines?

Floatation Energy

Floatation Energy have posted this press release on their web site, which is entitled Flotation Energy and Vårgrønn Awarded Exclusivity To Develop Up To 1.9 GW Of Floating Offshore Wind In Scotland.

The first part of the press release, has a graphic.

It shows how their proposed system will work.

  • A floating wind farm will be placed between the shore and oil and gas platforms to be decarbonised.
  • The wind farm will be connected to the shore by means of a bi-directional cable, so that the wind farm can export electricity to the grid and when the wind isn’t blowing the grid can power the platforms.
  • A cable between the wind farm and the platforms completes the system.

It is a simple system, where all elements have been built many times.

Floatation Energy must have been fairly confident that their bids would be successful as they have already named the farms and set up web sites.

The websites are very informative.

The Timeline for 2019-2021 on the Green Volt web site describes the describes the progress so far on the project.

2019 – As construction of the Kindardine offshore floating wind farm kicks off, Flotation Energy identifies the Buzzard oil facility (a relatively new oil and gas platform with a long field life and high electrical load) as the optimal starting point for a significant contribution to the North Sea Transition Deal – the process of replacing large scale, inefficient gas-fired power generation with renewable electricity from offshore wind.

2020 – Flotation Energy begins environmental surveys on the Ettrick/Blackbird oil field, a redundant site nearby Buzzard, which is in the process of decommissioning. The “brownfield” site is confirmed as an exceptional opportunity to create an offshore floating wind farm, with water depths of 90-100m and high quality wind resource.

2021 – Flotation Energy works with regulators to understand the potential for project “Green Volt” to decarbonise offshore power generation for Buzzard. Flotation Energy completes and submits an Environmental Scoping report to Marine Scotland, reaching the first major milestone in the Marine Consent process. Crown Estate Scotland announces a new leasing round for Innovation and Targeted Oil and Gas Decarbonisation (INTOG).

On a section on the Cenos web site, there is a section called Efficient Grid Connection, where this is said.

The power generated by the wind turbines will be Alternating Current (AC) and routed to a substation platform. AC power will be exported to the oil and gas platforms.

For efficient export to the UK grid, the substation platform will include a converter station to change the AC power to Direct Current (DC) before the power is transported to shore. This is due to transporting AC power over long distances leading to much of the power being lost.

Cenos is working in partnership with the consented NorthConnect interconnector project, to utilise their DC cable routing where possible. Cenos will also use the NorthConnect onshore converter station planned for Fourfields near Boddam, which then has an agreed link into the Peterhead Substation. This collaboration minimises the need to construct additional infrastructure for the Cenos project.

That all sounds very practical.

Note.

  1. Floatation Energy delivered the Kincardine offshore floating wind farm.
  2. Both wind farms appear to use the same shore substation.
  3. Buzzard oil field is being expanded, so it could be an even more excellent oil field to decarbonise.
  4. NorthConnect is a bit of an on-off project.

Floatation Energy seem to have made a very professional start to the delivery of their two wind farms.

Harbour Energy

The Wikipedia entry for Harbour Energy describes the company like this.

Harbour Energy plc is an independent oil and gas company based in Edinburgh, Scotland. It is the United Kingdom’s largest independent oil and gas business. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.

But if you look at news items and the share price of the company, things could look better for Harbour Energy.

On their map of UK operations, I can count nearly twenty oil and gas fields.

As they have other oil and gas fields around the world, decarbonisation of their offshore operations could increase production by a few percent and substantially cut their carbon emissions.

That is a philosophy that could be good for profits and ultimately the share price.

So has the company gone for a very simple approach of two identical floating wind turbines?

They have been successful in obtaining leases for sites 8 and 13.

  • Both have a capacity of 15 MW, so are the farms a single 15 MW wind turbine?
  • I think this is likely, unless it is decided to opt for say a 16 MW turbine.
  • Or even a smaller one, if the platform is in a bad place for wind.
  • The wind turbine would be parked by the platform to be decarbonised and connected up, to a simple substation on the platform.
  • I would recommend a battery on the platform, so that if the wind wasn’t blowing, power was still supplied to the platform.
  • There would be no need for any cable between shore and wind farm and the only substation, would be a relatively simple one with a battery on the platform.

It could be a very efficient way of decarbonising a large number of platforms.

Once Harbour Energy have proved the concept, I could build a simple mathematical model in Excel, to work out any change in profitability and carbon emissions for a particular oil or gas platform.

Who Is Britannia Ltd?

In this document from the Crown Estate Scotland, there is a section that gives the partners in each project.

Listed for site 8 are Chrysaor (U.K.) and Britannia Limited and for site 13 is Chryasaor Petroleum Company UK Limited.

This page on the Harbour Energy web site gives the history of Chrysaor and Harbour Energy.

This is the heading.

Chrysaor was founded in 2007 with the purpose of applying development and commercial skills to oil and gas assets and to realise their value safely.

This is the history.

The Group grew rapidly over the years through a series of acquisitions. With backing from Harbour Energy – an investment vehicle formed by EIG Global Energy Partners – Chrysaor acquired significant asset packages in the UK North Sea from Shell (2017) and ConocoPhillips (2019) to become the UK’s largest producer of hydrocarbons.

In 2021, Chrysaor merged with Premier Oil to become Harbour Energy plc.

So that explains the use of the Chrysaor name or Chryasaor as someone misspelt it on the Crown Estate Scotland document.

I asked myself, if Britannia Ltd. could be a technology company, so I checked them out. The only company, I could find was a former investment trust, that was dissolved over ten years ago.

But Britannia is an oil and gas field in the North Sea, which is partially owned by Harbour Energy. It has a page on Harbour Enerrgy’s web site, which is entitled Greater Britannia Area.

This is said about the Britannia field.

Britannia in Block 16/26 of the UK central North Sea sits approximately 210-kilometres north east of Aberdeen. The complex consists of a drilling, production and accommodation platform, a long-term compression module of mono-column design and a 90-metre bridge connected to a production and utilities platform. Britannia is one of the largest natural gas and condensate fields in the North Sea. Commercial production began in 1998. Condensate is delivered through the Forties Pipeline to the oil stabilisation and processing plant at Kerse of Kinneil near Grangemouth and natural gas is transported through a dedicated Britannia pipeline to the Scottish Area Gas Evacuation (SAGE) facility at St Fergus.

Looking at the maps on the Crown Estate Scotland, Harbour Energy and others, it looks like site 8 could be close to the

Greater Britannia Area or even the Britannia field itself.

Simply Blue Energy

Simply Blue Energy are developing the 100 MW Salamander wind farm.

I wrote about this project in The Salamander Project.

Did it get chosen, as it was a project, where the design was at an advanced stage?

TotalEnergies

I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that TotalEnergies have gone a very similar route to Harbour Energy, but they are trying it out with a 3 MW turbine.

Conclusion

They are an excellent group of good ideas and let’s hope that they make others think in better and move innovative ways.

Politics will never save the world, but engineering and science just might!

March 25, 2023 Posted by | Energy, World | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

£100m Boost For Biggest UK Hydro Scheme In Decades

The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the BBC.

This is the sub-heading.

A giant hydro scheme which would double the UK’s ability to store energy for long periods is taking a leap forward with a £100m investment by SSE.

These are the first three paragraphs.

The proposed 92m-high dam and two reservoirs at Coire Glas in the Highlands would be Britain’s biggest hydroelectric project for 40 years.

Scottish ministers approved the 1.5 GW pumped storage facility in 2020.

But power giant SSE wants assurances from the UK government before finally signing it off.

There are two major problems with this scheme.

Why The Forty Year Wait?

I am an Electrical and Control Engineer and it is a scandal that we are waiting forty years for another pumped storage scheme like the successful  Electric Mountain or Cruachan power stations to arrive.

Petrol or diesel vehicles have batteries for these three main purposes.

  • To start the engine.
  • To stabilise the output of the generator or alternator.
  • To provide emergency power.

As to the latter, I can’t be the only person, who has dragged a car out of a ford on the starter motor. But think of the times, you’ve used the hazard warning lights, after an accident or an engine failure.

The nightmare of any operator of a complicated electricity network like the UK’s is a black start, which is defined by Wikipedia like this.

A black start is the process of restoring an electric power station or a part of an electric grid to operation without relying on the external electric power transmission network to recover from a total or partial shutdown.

Hydro electric power stations and especially those that are part of pumped storage schemes are ideal for providing the initial power, as they are often easy to start and have water available. Cruachan power station has a black start capability, but at 440 MW is it big enough?

Over the last few years, many lithium-ion batteries have been added to the UK power network, which are used to stabilise the grid, when the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing.

There are four pumped storage hydro-electric schemes in the UK.

Note.

  1. I always give the power output and the storage capacity for a battery, if it is known.
  2. According to Wikipedia, Scotland has a potential for around 500 GWh of pumped storage.
  3. The largest lithium-ion battery that I know, that is being planned in the UK, is Intergen’s 320 MW/640 MWh battery at Thames Gateway, that I wrote about in Giant Batteries Will Provide Surge Of Electricity Storage. It’s smaller than any of the four current pumped storage schemes.
  4. The Wikipedia entry for Coire Glas says that it is a 1.5 GW/30 GWh pumped storage hydro-electric power station.

I very much feel that even one 1.5 GW/30 GWh pumped storage hydro-electric power station must make a big difference mathematically.

Why have we had to wait so long? It’s not as though a pumped storage hydro-electric power station of this size has suffered a serious disaster.

Drax Needs Assurances Too?

The BBC article says this.

Scotland’s only other pumped storage scheme, operated by Drax Group, is housed within a giant artificial cavern inside Ben Cruachan on the shores of Loch Awe in Argyll.

The North Yorkshire-based company plans to more than double the generating capacity of its facility, nicknamed Hollow Mountain, to more than 1GW, with the construction of a new underground power station.

But both Drax and SSE have been reluctant to press ahead without assurances from Whitehall.

It looks like the right assurances would open up at least two pumped storage hydro-electric power station projects.

But it could be better than that, as there are other projects under development.

This totals to 3750 MW/104.3 GWh or 5850 MW/134.3 GWh with the addition of Coire Glas and the extension to Cruachan.

Getting the assurances right could result in large amounts of construction in Scotland!

What Assurances Do Power Giants SSE And Drax Want Before Signing Off?

This news item on SSE Renewables, which is dated 18th March 2022, is entitled Ministerial Roundtable Seeks To Unlock Investment In UK Energy Storage.

These three paragraphs gives details of the meeting.

Business leaders have met with UK Energy Minister the Rt Hon Greg Hands MP to discuss how the government could unlock significant investment in vital energy storage technologies needed to decarbonise the power sector and help ensure greater energy independence.

The meeting was organised by the Long-Duration Electricity Storage Alliance, a new association of companies, progressing plans across a range of technologies to be first of their kind to be developed in the UK for decades.

Representatives from Drax, SSE Renewables, Highview Power and Invinity Energy Systems met with The Rt Hon Greg Hands MP, Minister of State for Business, Energy and Clean Growth [yesterday].

But they still don’t seem to have come up with a funding mechanism.

  • In this case, it seems that multiple politicians may not be to blame, as Greg Hands was the Minister of State for Business, Energy and Clean Growth until the 6th of September 2022, when he handed over to Graham Stuart, who is still the incumbent.
  • Could it be that civil servants for this problem need to be augmented by a Control Engineer with mathematical modelling skills from a practical university?

It is the sort of problem, I would love to get my teeth into, but unfortunately my three mentors in accountancy and banking; Bob, Brian and David, who could have helped me, have all passed on to another place to help someone else with their problems.

I’ve just had a virtual meeting with all three and they told me to look at it like a warehousing system.

Consider.

  • It would be very easy to measure the amount of water stored in the upper reservoir of a pumped storage hydro-electric power station.
  • It would also be easy to measure the electricity flows to and from the pumped storage hydro-electric power station.
  • A monetary value could be placed on the water in the upper reservoir and the flows, depending on the current price for electricity.

So it should be possible to know that a pumped storage hydro-electric power station, was perhaps storing energy as follows.

  • 10 GWh for SSE
  • 8 GWh for RWE
  • 6 GWh for Scottish Power
  • 6 GWh is not being used

And just as in a warehouse, they would pay a fee of so much for storing each GWh for an hour.

  • The system would work with any type of storage.
  • Would competition between the various storage sites bring down prices for storing electricity?
  • Pumped storage operators would get a bonus when it rained heavily.
  • Just as they do now, electricity generators would store it when prices are low and retrieve it when prices are high.

A lot of the rules used to decide where electricity goes would still work.

 

 

March 22, 2023 Posted by | Energy, Energy Storage, Finance & Investment | , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

SSE, Marubeni & CIP’s Floating Wind Farm In Scotland Could Have 270 Turbines And 6 Offshore Substations

The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.

This is the sub-heading.

SSE Renewables, Marubeni and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) have submitted the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Scoping Report for the array area of their Ossian floating wind farm to Marine Scotland. According to the report, the wind farm could have up to 270 wind turbines and six offshore substations.

Ossian floating wind farm will be one of the world’s largest floating wind farms.

  • If it sticks to 3.6 GW, 270 turbines will mean 13 MW turbines.
  • 14 MW would be 3.8 GW and 15 MW would be 4 GW, with the same number of turbines.
  • If they stick to 3.6 GW, this could be 257 x 14 MW or 240 x 15 MW turbines.
  • Knowing ambitious engineers as I do and given that 15 MW turbines are on the way, I wouldn’t be surprised to see 15 MW turbines, to get the full 4 GW.
  • According to this press release from Siemens Gamesa, they can make the turbine blades for their 15 MW turbines in Hull.

These two paragraphs outline the design possibilities.

For the floating wind turbine foundations, the consortium is considering either semi-submersible or Tension Leg Platform (TLP) structures and three mooring configurations; catenary, semi taut and taut mooring lines. Anchoring options currently under consideration include driven piles, and a number of different embedded anchor types, including suction piles, Drag Embedment Anchors (DEA) and VLA, with up to nine anchors required per foundation.

Floating foundations might not only be used for the wind turbines, but also for Ossian’s offshore substations.

When I look at a project like this, I also think of the project management possibilities.

  • Will the six offshore sub-stations be positioned, so that as turbines are installed, they can be commissioned and start generating electricity?
  • Is there software to optimise the order of installation?
  • Has a specialist project management system been written for wind farms?

If you need a program to do analyse anything like that, buy me a drink and we’ll talk about it.

It’s about time, some of the algorithms in my brain were put to use.

The article also says this.

The 3.6 GW Ossian floating wind farm is planned to be up and running before the end of the decade.

My experience tells me, that if the right philosophy is used, that estimated date could be beaten.

It’s just that it is a project with so many complexities, that a proper mathematical model of its construction would yield benefits.

March 17, 2023 Posted by | Energy | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Dogger Bank Wind Farm Officially Celebrates Its Operations And Maintenance Base Opening

The title of this post is the same as that of this news item on the Dogger Bank wind farm web site.

These bullet points introduce the item.

  • 150 guests and employees gathered to celebrate the official opening.
  • The state-of-the-art base will be the hub for operations and monitor 5% of UK electricity from its control room.
  • Over 400 long-term jobs have been created locally to support Operations and Maintenance from South Tyneside for the 35-year life of the wind farm.
  • The world-class facility will be operated in line with the UK Green Building Council’s (UKGBC) Net Zero Carbon Buildings Framework

This Google Map shows the location of the base.

The red arrow indicates the base, which appears to be convenient for the North Sea.

This second Google Map shows a close up if the site.

There is a nice long quayside, which in the future could be large enough to assemble floating turbines.

This third image is a Google Map 3D visualisation of the site from across the Tyne.

The news item says this about the ownership and operation of the Dogger Bank wind farm.

Dogger Bank Wind Farm is a joint venture between SSE Renewables (40%), Equinor (40%) and Vårgrønn (20%). SSE Renewables is lead operator for the development and construction of Dogger Bank Wind Farm. Equinor will be lead operator of the wind farm on completion for its expected operational life of around 35 years.

Initially, the Port of Tyne base will operate and maintain these wind farms.

  • Dogger Bank A – 1235 MW
  • Dogger Bank B – 1235 MW
  • Dogger Bank C – 1218 MW

This gives a total of 3688 MW.

Note.

  1. SSE Renewables and Equinor are also developing the 1500 MW Dogger Bank D wind farm.
  2. This would bring the total up to 5188 MW.
  3. RWE are also developing the 3000 MW Dogger Bank South wind farm.

Leases were signed for both the Dogger Bank D and Dogger Bank South wind farms in January 2023.

I doubt all of these wind farms will be operated and maintained from the Port of Tyne base, due to the different ownership of Dogger Bank South.

But, I do hope that the facility can be expanded to handle Dogger Bank D.

March 15, 2023 Posted by | Energy | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Case For Pumped Hydro Storage

The Coire Glas Project

Note that Coire Glas is a pumped storage hydroelectric scheme being developed by SSE Renewables.

  • It is rated at 1.5 GW.
  • It can store 30 GWh of electricity.
  • It is being built in the Highlands of Scotland above Loch Lochy.
  • The estimated construction time will be five to six years.
  • It should be operational for more than 50 years.
  • There is more about the project on this page on the Coire Glas web site.

Exploratory works have started.

The Case For Pumped Hydro Storage

The title of this post, as the same as that of this page on the Coire Glas web site.

This is the sub-heading.

A study by independent researchers from Imperial College London found that investing in 4.5GW of pumped hydro storage, with 90GWh of storage could save up to £690m per year in energy system costs by 2050, as the UK transitions to a net-zero carbon emission system.

And this is the first paragraph.

The report focused on the benefits of new long-duration pumped hydro storage in Scotland, as the current most established long-duration energy storage technology. The benefit of long duration storage compared to short duration batteries is being able to continuously charge up the storage with excess renewables and also discharge power to the grid for several hours or days when wind and solar output is low.

So Coire Glas will provide 1.5GW/30GW, so where will we get the other 3 GW/60GW?

Loch Earba Pumped Hydro

In Gilkes Reveals 900MW Scottish Pumped Storage Plan, I introduced Loch Earba Pumped Hydro.

  • It is rated at 900 MW
  • It can store 33 GWh of electricity.
  • It is being built in the Highlands of Scotland to the East of Fort William.
  • The estimated construction time will be three to four years.
  • It should be operational for more than 50 years.
  • There is more about the project on the Earba Storage web site.

It would appear we could be edging towards the Imperial College target in lumps of about 1GW/30 GWh.

Other Schemes In Scotland

These are other proposed or planned schemes in Scotland.

Balliemeanoch Pumped Hydro

Balliemeanoch Pumped Hydro now has a web site.

The proposed Balliemeanoch pumped hydro scheme will have these characteristics.

  • Output of the power station will be 1.5 GW
  • Available storage could be 45 GWh.

This medium-sized station has a lot of storage.

Corrievarkie Pumped Hydro

Corrievarkie Pumped Hydro now has a web site.

The proposed Corrievarkie pumped hydro scheme will have these characteristics.

  • Output of the power station will be 600 MW
  • Available storage could be 14.5 GWh.

This medium-sized station has a moderate amount of storage.

Loch Kemp Pumped Hydro

I wrote about Loch Kemp Pumped Hydro in Loch Kemp Pumped Hydro, where I said this.

The proposed Loch Kemp pumped hydro scheme will have these characteristics.

  • Loch Kemp will be the upper reservoir.
  • Loch Ness will be the lower reservoir.
  • The power station will be on the banks of Loch Ness.
  • The power station will be designed to fit into the environment.
  • Eight dams will be built to enlarge Loch Kemp.
  • Trees will be planted.
  • Output of the power station will be 300 MW
  • Available storage could be 9 GWh.

The medium-sized station will have almost as much storage capacity as Electric Mountain, but that power station has an output of 1.8 GW.

Red John Pumped Hydro

I wrote about Red John Pumped Hydro in Red John Pumped Storage Hydro Project, where I said this.

I have also found a web site for the project, which is part of the ILI Group web site.

  • The scheme has an output of 450 MW.
  • The storage capacity is 2,800 MWh or 2.8 GWh.
  • The scheme has planning consent.
  • The project is budgeted to cost £550 million.
  • The construction program indicates that the scheme will be completed by the end of 2025.

Not a large scheme, but every little helps.

Proposed Pumped Hydro In Scotland

I have listed these schemes.

Note.

  1. The scheme’s name is linked to their web site.
  2. The two figures are output and storage capacity.

There is a total output of 5.25 GW and a total storage capacity of 134.3 GWh.

Conclusion

If all these schemes are built, Imperial’s targets of an output of 4.5 GW and a storage capacity of 90 GWh will be comfortably exceeded.

 

February 19, 2023 Posted by | Energy, Energy Storage | , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

SSE Renewables Lays Out Plans To Bolster Ties With Fishing Industry

The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshorewind.biz.

This is the sub-heading.

SSE Renewables has published a report that sets out the company’s vision to better co-exist with fisheries when building and developing offshore wind energy.

Sounds like a good idea on the line of Jaw, jaw is better than war, war!

The original press release is here.

January 25, 2023 Posted by | Energy, Food | , , | Leave a comment

Scotland’s Largest Offshore Wind Farm Entering Home Stretch

The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.

December 5, 2022 Posted by | Energy | , , , , , | 2 Comments

Ossian Floating Wind Farm Could Have Capacity Of 3.6 GW

The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz,

This is the first paragraph.

SSE Renewables, Marubeni Corporation, and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) have identified an increase in the potential overall project capacity for their Ossian floating wind project in Scotland from 2.6 GW to up to 3.6 GW.

It appears that surveys have shown that the wind farm can be bigger.

About The Name Ossian

This press release from SSE is entitled New Offshore Wind Farm To Take Name From Scottish Literature.

These three paragraphs explain the name and the partners behind the project.

A new wind farm project in Scotland is to take its name from an historic series of books which depict the epic quests of a third-century Scottish leader, following his adventures across rolling seas.

Ossian (pronounced ‘os-si-un’) from The Poems of Ossian is to be the name for the proposed new offshore wind farm across 858 km2 of seabed in waters off the east coast of Scotland.

The project will be delivered by the partnership of leading Scottish renewable energy developer, SSE Renewables, Japanese conglomerate Marubeni Corporation (Marubeni) and Danish fund management company Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP).

I don’t think the three partners will have any difficulty raising the extra finance to expand the wind farm.

Where Is The Ossian Wind Farm?

This Crown Estate Scotland map shows the position of each of the Scotwind wind farms.

Note, that the numbers are Scotwind’s lease number in their documents.

The Ossian wind farm is numbered two.

At present, the South Eastern group of wind farms are as follows.

  • 1 – BP – Fixed – 2.9 GW
  • 2 – SSE – Floating – 2.6 GW
  • 3 – Falck – Floating – 1.2 GW
  • 4 – Shell – Floating – 2.0 GW
  • 5 – Vattenfall – Floating – 0.8 GW
  • 6 – DEME – Fixed – 1.0 GW

This totals to 10.5 GW, which would be 11.5 GW, if the capacity of Ossian is increased.

Will Ossian And Nearby Wind Farms Be Developed As A Co-Operation?

The six companies involved in this group of wind farms, are all experienced developers of wind farms or oil and gas fields.

They also come from all around the world, so I can see the best technology being employed on this group of wind farms.

Will Other Wind Farms In The Group Be Expanded?

The surveys at Ossian appear to have shown that the area is ideal for floating wind and this is enabling the expansion of the farm.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see some of the other wind farms be expanded.

I also feel that floating wind farms like Ossian, where it is likely that all the turbines on their floats are connected to a central substation, that could also be floating, may be a lot easier to expand.

Does Ossian Wind Farm Have A Web Site?

Not that Google can find, although ossianwindfarm.com appears to be under construction.

November 4, 2022 Posted by | Energy | , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Plans Emerge For 8 GW Of Offshore Wind On Dogger Bank

Wikipedia has an entry, which is a List Of Offshore Wind Farms In The United Kingdom.

The totals are worth a look.

  • Operational – 13279 MW
  • Under Construction – 4125 MW
  • Proposed Under The UK Government’s Contracts For Difference Round 3 – 2412 MW
  • Proposed Under The UK Government’s Contracts For Difference Round 4 – 7026 MW
  • Exploratory Phase, But No Contract for Difference – Scotland – 24,826 MW
  • Exploratory Phase, But No Contract for Difference – England – 14,500 MW

Note.

  1. That gives a Grand Total of 66,168 MW or 66.168 GW.
  2. The government’s target is 50 GW of offshore wind by 2030.
  3. The typical UK power need is around 23 GW, so with nuclear and solar, we could be approaching three times the electricity generation capacity that we currently need.

The figures don’t include projects like Berwick Bank, Cerulean Wind, Norfolk Vanguard or Northern Horizons, which are not mentioned in Wikipedia’s list.

I regularly look at the list of wind farms in this Wikipedia entry and noticed that the number of Dogger Bank wind farms had increased.

They are now given as.

  • Dogger Bank A – 1200 MW – Completion in 2023/24
  • Dogger Bank B – 1200 MW – Completion in 2024/25
  • Dogger Bank C – 1200 MW – Completion in 2024/25
  • Dogger Bank D – 1320 MW – No Completion Given
  • Dogger Bank South – 3000 MW – No Completion Given

Note, that gives a Grand Total of 7920 MW or 7.920 GW.

This article on offshoreWIND.biz is entitled BREAKING: SSE, Equinor Plan 1.3 GW Dogger Bank D Offshore Wind Project.

It was published on the October 6th, 2022 and starts with this summary.

SSE Renewables and Equinor are looking into building what would be the fourth part of Dogger Bank Wind Farm, the world’s largest offshore wind farm, whose three phases (A, B and C) are currently under construction. Surveys are now underway at an offshore site where the partners want to develop Dogger Bank D, which would bring Dogger Bank Wind Farm’s total capacity to nearly 5 GW if built.

Obviously, there are a few ifs and buts about this development, but it does look like SSE Renewables and Equinor are serious about developing Dogger Bank D.

More Dogger Bank Gigawatts for UK As RWE Moves Forward With Two 1.5 GW Projects

This subheading describes, the 3 GW wind farm, that I listed earlier as Dogger Bank South.

These three paragraphs describe the projects.

RWE is now moving forward with two new offshore wind farms in the Zone, each with a 1.5 GW generation capacity, after the company obtained approval from the UK Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) to enter into an Agreement for Lease with The Crown Estate this Summer, following the Round 4 leasing process.

The wind farms will be built at two adjacent sites located just southwest of the Dogger Bank A offshore wind farm and are dubbed Dogger Bank South (DBS) East and Dogger Bank South (DBS) West.

RWE has also started with geophysical seabed surveys within the wind turbine array areas for its two new projects.

It appears that they have already got the leasing process started.

When Will Dogger Bank D And Dogger Bank South Be Operational?

Consider.

  • In How Long Does It Take To Build An Offshore Wind Farm?, showed that a lot of offshore wind farms have gone from planning permission to first operation in six years.
  • I don’t think that there will be planning permission problems on the Dogger Bank.
  • The two wind farms are a continuation of Dogger Bank A, B and C and the Sofia wind farms.
  • A lot of the construction, would be more of the same.

With average luck, I can see Dogger Bank D and Dogger Bank South in full production before the end of 2028.

October 16, 2022 Posted by | Energy | , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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