UK: Global Marine Systems to Maintain Ormonde Transmission Link

Offshore Transmission Operator Transmission Capital Partners has contracted with Global Marine Systems Energy Ltd., the largest independent provider of subsea power cable installation, maintenance and related engineering services worldwide, to provide cable repair and maintenance services for the transmission link at the Ormonde offshore wind farm.

The groundbreaking cable maintenance agreement is designed to ensure that the transmission link is inspected and maintained properly over its service life.

Key features of the agreement include:

– A framework agreement for cable related incidents, such as repairs, surveys and re-burial activities.

– The selection of Global Marine Energy as the preferred subsea cable repair contractor.

– A 24/7 call out facility provided by Global Marine Energy for submarine cable fault location

– The production of a set of agreed procedures to cover submarine cable related incidents at the Ormonde site.

“The role of the OFTO is to ensure that once built, the offshore transmission system is properly maintained and repaired as needed,” said Chris Veal, Director at Transmission Capital Partners. “Global Marine has been in the business of maintaining subsea cables for well over 160 years. We are glad to have them as part of the Ormonde Transmission link maintenance programme, and look forward to working with them throughout the coming years to keep the electricity flowing through this important asset.”

A leader in the Offshore Transmission Regime (OFTO), Transmission Capital Partners was selected by Ofgem in 2010 to run the transmission link for the 150 MW Ormonde offshore windfarm off the Cumbrian coast. The Ormonde transmission link transmits around 500 GW hours of electricity every year, enough to supply 100,000 homes and is valued at over £100m.

As part of the agreement, Global Marine Energy will also create and manage a site-specific cable system database allowing appropriate parties to easily view and analyse data relevant to the transmission link maintenance over the life of the system.

“Maintenance of large scale offshore transmission assets is quite new in the energy industry, and Transmission Capital Partners are a leader in this important segment. We are pleased to have been selected by them to maintain the Ormonde transmission link,” said Mark Leggett, Global Marine Energy CEO. “We look forward to working with them to bring our longstanding experience and best practices in maintaining such assets from other sectors, such as telecommunications, into the Energy industry here in the UK.” 

The Offshore Transmission Regime was established by the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and Ofgem’s delivery arm, Ofgem E-Serve, to deliver high voltage links to offshore wind farms as cost effectively as possible. Over the coming years high-voltage cable links worth over £20 billion will be needed to connect a potential of around 50GW of offshore wind in UK waters.

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Offshore WIND staff, July 12, 2012; Image: Vattenfall