Marine aids to navigation around offshore wind farms

During October, the Canada-headquartered navigation technology company Sabik Offshore and Netherlands based outfit Orga Aviation launched a collaborative initiative to create and commercialise an integrated marine aids to navigation and aviation obstruction solution specifically designed to enable 'safe sea and air navigation in the vicinity of offshore wind farms.'

So, what will the project entail? And what are the most recent trends and developments elsewhere in the growing field of navigational aid technologies around offshore wind energy sites?

INTEGRATED SYSTEM

As the European offshore wind energy sector continues to grow, strategies aimed at managing the safe navigation of seaborne installation, operations and maintenance vessels - as well as commercial and military aircraft - in and around wind farms remain a top priority, leading to the emergence of a burgeoning navigation aids sector.

One of the early front runners in the field is Sabik Offshore, which since 2008 has established a growing reputation as a specialist provider of ID markings and marine aids to navigation solutions for offshore wind farms - and which has installed its NAi systems on more than 1400 Turbines across 25 platforms. The company works with offshore developers throughout the life cycle of energy projects to carry out tasks like providing temporary marking during the construction phase - as well as more permanent solutions following completion.

Now, in an effort to further enhance the sophistication of the navigation aid technologies offered to offshore wind developers, the company has agreed to team up with experienced aviation obstruction lighting provider Orga Aviation. Although coy about the exact details, Jeremy Tygielski, International Business Development Manager at Sabik Offshore, reveals that a key objective of the new collaboration is to develop a completely new navigation platform that will bring the technologies produced by the two companies together into a 'more integrated system' than ever seen before.

"The new integrated platform will reduce the amount of cabling, third party products and battery backup systems," he says.

"The main advantages of integrated navigation solution will be the provision of more value to customers - as well as an improvement in their cost and installation processes," he adds.

As part of the new agreement, Sabik Offshore will now also act as the single point of contact throughout the entire sales and project implementation process - an innovation Tygielski says has been requested by the company's client base for 'some time.'

BUOYANT SECTOR

A number of UK companies also continue to work closely with wind farm developers to devise navigation solutions in and around facilities. One such company is Hampshire based Hydrosphere, which launched an increasingly popular rental service for navigation buoys and lights, as well as data buoy platforms in 2013. Earlier this year, Maritime Journal also reported that the firm had been earmarked to supply a total of seven cardinal marks to the £1.5 Billion Statoil backed Dudgeon Offshore Wind Farm.

Elsewhere in the UK, Fife, Scotland based Briggs Marine - now one of the largest independent suppliers of Aids to Navigation services within the UK - currently holds contracts to supply, inspect and refurbish some 722 Aids to Navigation, such as lighthouses, beacons, buoys and lightships, for a wide range of customers, including the Ministry of Defence, as well as clients in major ports, utility providers and the UK renewable energy industry.

"Given the increase in renewable energies and growth in the installation of offshore wind farms, we have been working with wind farm developers in providing and deploying floating aids to navigation - or buoys," says John Pirie, Aids to Navigation Manager at Briggs Marine.

"The buoys are located around the perimeter of the sites to indicate to mariners a safe direction of navigation during the construction stage. At most wind farms, the buoys’ specifications require a conspicuous daymark and a lantern providing a 5nm range during darkness," he adds.

Over the last few years, Pirie reveals that Briggs has also deployed its 3m buoys at “several wind farm sites at up to 50 miles offshore in harsh environments” - including at two of the UK's most advanced weather monitoring stations, the 7200MW East Anglia Offshore Wind Zone off the Norfolk and Suffolk coast and the Burbo extension. The company is also currently preparing a total of ten buoys for deployment at the Walney windfarm extension.

In the future, Pirie also predicts that vessel traffic in and around offshore wind farms will become “larger and faster” and occur mainly during the day - prompting the company to manufacture buoy structures, “which can be easily identified as daymarks by mariners from a distance without confusion, and which provide a radar return.”

NAVIGATING THE LAWS AND GUIDELINES

Under the 1995 Merchant Shipping Act, all third party providers of Aids to Navigation have a duty to seek prior consent from the General Lighthouse Authorities for the establishment, alteration or removal of any lighthouses, buoys or beacons. The consent process helps to ensure that providers place a navigation aid that meets the International Association of Marine Aids to Navigation and Lighthouse Authorities (IALA) guidelines and recommendations. To increase the chances that best practice is followed at every stage from design and manufacture through to deployment, offshore developers also often demand that navigation contractors hold an IALA Managers certificate.

In recognition of the challenges that offshore renewable energy installations present to the 'safe navigation and communication of shipping and emergency rescue' the UK government has also recently produced a comprehensive guidance note it believes is particularly useful for offshore developers. Amongst other things, the note also provides detailed information on navigation and voyage planning to assist developers in assessing risks and planning safe passage - as well as an overview of research on the impact offshore installations have on 'marine radar, communications and positioning systems and search and rescue helicopter operations.'