Energising the future
The generation of electricity by harnessing offshore wind power has developed rapidly over the last few years. Owner operators and installation companies are therefore continuing to look at new ways of improving efficiencies and reducing maintenance lifecycle costs using new innovative solutions and technologies.When installing a wind turbine, a delay of more than a few days between mono pile installation, transition piece placement and grouting operations can be costly as marine growth and other surface debris can quickly appear on the mono pile surface. As surface cleanliness of the pile is critical for effective grouting, all loose debris and marine growth needs to be removed quickly and effectively to prevent any costly problems later on.
Proserv Offshore's Aberdeen facility has designed, developed and manufactured a Marine Growth Removal (MGR) tool which is deployed from a support vessel and located directly upon the open pile. The surface of the pile is then prepared by lowering a hydraulically controlled cleaning sub frame down the pile; utilising high pressure water jets mounted on a track, a full 360 degrees by 450mm wide path is cleaned around the pile.
Once the carriage has completed a full rotation around the track, the support fabrication is lowered to the next position and the process is repeated in the opposite direction until all the transition area has been prepared to the required standard.
Using the Marine Growth Removal tool, a pile of 4.7m in diameter can be completely prepared to a depth of 8m in less than two hours. Considering it would take a diving team more than 30 hours to achieve the same result, this is a significant time saving for our customers.
Enter √ at www.engineerlive.com/iog
Proserve Offshore is based in Kintore, Aberdeenshire, UK. www.proserv-offshore.com
