ORE Catapult and Synaptec Battle Offshore Cable Failure Costs

Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult and Synaptec have partnered in a project aimed at reducing the cost of subsea cable failures and accompanying monitoring systems.

Synaptec’s Refase technology will be installed at ORE Catapult’s 7MW Levenmouth Demonstration Turbine for a year-long trial to establish cost savings and benefits of using distributed, passive sensors to monitor performance.

The project aims to reduce costs by automating the response to cable faults and developing long-term prognostics capabilities to improve O&M cost through power quality and dynamic line rating data streamed from up to 50 locations per system, Synaptec said.

“You can’t manage if you can’t measure, so affordable visibility and control of remote offshore assets is urgently needed to drive down cost and make clean energy more affordable,” said Saul Matthews, Head of Business Development at Synaptec.

“Our work with ORE Catapult at Levenmouth will show that transmission-grade distributed sensor systems like this are the best way to address the industry’s single largest operating cost – cable failures.”

According to the parties, subsea cable failures and resulting outages continue to be a priority area for improvement in the industry, although inter-array cable faults are less understood than export cable failures.

The project is anticipated to give access to a better understanding of all power cable faults and demonstrate the potential of Synaptec’s technology platform as a long-term automated asset management system.