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As the offshore wind industry continues gaining in maturity, with more investment commitments across Europe, risk mitigation is becoming an increasingly important area for developers and investors.

It’s hardly news that the shipping industry is mobilising to meet the demands of wave after wave of new environmental regulations. From the IMO’s ballast water management legislation to EEDI (the Energy Efficiency Design Index for new ships) and SEEMP (Ship Energy Efficiency Management Plan), shipowners need to be ready to drastically cut energy consumption and emissions.

BVG Associates has recently analysed the effects of increasing the wind speed limit for turbine component lifts. The results of this analysis are described in detail in a new report, “Impact of the Boom Lock tool on offshore wind cost of energy”.

The list of potentially dangerous or simply-too-expensive-to-lose substances being pumped from one part of an industrial process to another somewhere in the world is long. Take isocyanates, for example. They’re the raw materials that make up all polyurethane products.

To improve profitability, offshore wind farms are moving further offshore and significantly growing in size. The latest example is the 1200 MW Hornsea project, located 120 kilometres off the UK coast with more than 170 turbines.

The offshore wind industry faces a well-known paradox. It needs wind to generate electricity, but too much wind makes it difficult to create the necessary infrastructure. Quite simply, lifting major components in high winds is one of the biggest issues facing offshore wind turbine installation. Over the years, thousands of days of installation time have been lost, leading to cost increases in the billions of Euros and huge project delays.

Offshore wind now accounts for about 7% of European renewable energy generation. Most of this new capacity has been built since 2015. Although the rate of growth has been slower than many expected or hoped, it is still a significant shift in the way Europe generates electricity. The change has been biggest in the UK, where offshore wind now generates about 5% of all its UK electricity demand.

As offshore wind turbine sizes grow rapidly, the technology needed to install and commission turbines is not following suit. This is a significant barrier to progress in the offshore wind industry and is continuing to make it difficult to reduce the levelised cost of energy.