Scour Prevention Systems Secures US Patent for SPM

Scour Prevention Systems has won a full US patent for its Scour Prevention Mattresses (SPM), designed to protect offshore structures, cables and pipelines from scour.

According to the company, the scour prevention team is already working with partners to supply its SPM products for the latest offshore wind projects in the US.

“Our run of successes in getting a string of international patents awarded for the SPM over the past 12 months has given us a great platform to expand our offer internationally,” Project Assistant Sarah Niddrie-Webb said.

“We will be starting with the US Offshore Wind sector which is predicting rapid growth with more than 8GW of installed capacity by 2030. This will take hundreds of new larger capacity turbines and thousands of kilometres of cabling, all of which needs protection!”

The product is already patented in the UK and other countries, including Japan and China, the company said, adding that SPMs have already been used to prevent scour and associated damage at subsea cable and foundation structures in the North Sea and are being considered for new projects offshore Africa and South East Asia.

The SPM is constructed from a matrix of end-of-life vehicle tyres which traps sediment to form a stable protective layer on the seabed or over cables and pipelines and has applications across the offshore and coastal marine markets, such as offshore wind and oil & gas, the company said.