Technology transfer from Offshore Oil & Gas to Offshore Wind Industry
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Jendrik Odenwald (General Manager, Surveyor) commenting in Renewable Energy World magazine:
"We have been observing the German offshore wind industry since 2009 when the projects got bigger and were springing up like mushrooms due to high financial incentives they received. The dynamic lead to the fact — as we noticed — that the whole industry basically started from scratch. Offshore wind farm operating companies were set up by German Energy supplying companies from nothing. The development and construction of wind turbines and the building of wind farms was so highly specialized and specifically engineered that there was no use for existing vessels or equipment from the oil and gas industry.
The German government’s regulations, decisions and money flow pushed the offshore wind industry into a vacuum that created an urgent need for knowledge, people and vessels and the capacities are there to supply the market sufficiently.
With the current oil and gas crisis it will be interesting to see whether and how oil and gas vessel operators will move into the wind market to compensate for their decreased revenues and how the offshore wind industry will react. This could potentially bring about the first stress test for the most highly financed wind vessel operators."
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2016/05/the-big-question-day-1-the-big-question-what-opportunities-exist-for-technology-transfer-from-offshore-oil-and-gas-to-the-offshore-wind-industry.html
