A project consortium led by Nekkar has conditionally been awarded a NOK 75.2 million (EUR 6.5 million) grant to develop remote-controlled, self-hoisting lifting equipment for the offshore wind industry.
The Nekkar-led consortium also includes Kongsberg Maritime, DOF, an undisclosed global wind farm developer, GCE Node, NORCE, Sustainable Energy Catapult Center, Sintef Ocean, and the University of Agder.
The consortium aims to develop a safe and efficient solution for main component replacement (MCR) on offshore wind turbines to reduce time, cost, and loss of revenue due to downtime.
The objective is to develop a main component replacement solution that can be utilised offshore on both floating and fixed-bottom wind turbine generators across OEMs, both for newbuilds as well as the installed base, said the consortium.
The project will be based on Nekkar’s SkyWalker wind turbine installation tool that moves up and down the turbine tower to replace the main components like gearbox, blade, etc. while on-site offshore.
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Also, a 3D motion-compensated crane will be developed with the purpose of lifting SkyWalker from a floating vessel to a floating turbine.
Further, specifications of a multi-purpose vessel integrating the requirements of SkyWalker and 3D crane will be developed. The project will also evaluate the impact of the solution from a total wind farm perspective using and developing existing tools for offshore logistics, vessel design, and marine operations.
The grant was awarded through the Norwegian Government’s Green Platform Initiative which is used to stimulate bigger and more rapid investments from companies in green sustainable solutions and products.
Norway has set a target of reaching net zero by 2050 and has committed to establishing 30 GW of offshore wind power by 2040.