Category Archives: Offshore

EDP Renewables and Engies Ocean Winds is working with renewables developer Disa Group to build offshore wind farms off the Canary Islands.

The projects would mainly focus on floating offshore wind projects due to the depths of the waters off the Canary Islands, they explained.

Ocean Winds and Disa claim their projects would help reduce the cost of electricity generation on the islands.

The developers would not confirm how much capacity they are planning to develop. They currently do not have a preferred floating platform for the projects.

Construction could start as soon as 2022, but a final project timeline including a commissioning date would be dependent on Spain approving its new. framework for offshore wind development, an Ocean Winds spokesman told Windpower Monthly.

They claim their projects could create up to 3,700 direct and indirect jobs in shipyards, auxiliary workshops, ports and other service industries.

The partners also stated that their projects would help Spain meet its renewable energy targets, which will be especially difficult in the Canary Islands.

Spain aims to double the share of renewable energy in its final energy consumption to 42% by 2030. In 2019, renewables accounted for 4% of electricity consumed in the Canary Islands.

Iberdrola and EnerOcean are also developing separate floating offshore wind farms off the Canary Islands.

Ocean Winds has experience in floating offshore wind, having developed the25MW WindFloat Atlantic WindFloat Atlantic (25MW) Offshoreoff Viana do Castelo, Portugal, Europe Click to see full details project off neighbouring Portugal.

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Ocean Winds plans Canary Islands floating offshore wind - Windpower Monthly

SINGAPORE - To keep the marine and offshore engineering sector in Singapore buoyant, a plan to boost its competitiveness is being updated by government agencies to account for disruptors such as Covid-19 and climate change.

Dr Tan See Leng, Second Minister for Trade and Industry, told Parliament on Tuesday (July 27) that the refreshed industry transformation map for the sector - which includes shipbuilding and repair, rig building and marine equipment - is slated to be launched in 2022.

"We expect offshore renewables and offshore carrier transport of hydrogen to be among the areas of opportunity in the refreshed map," he said in response to questions raised by Dr Tan Wu Meng (Jurong GRC).

The latter had asked the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) for an update on transformation plans for the carbon-intensive marine and offshore engineering sector. It was affected by negative oil prices due to Covid-19 lockdowns last year, and is expected to be impacted by a global push to tackle climate change, which entails shifting away from fossil fuels.

The marine and offshore engineering industry contributed $3.6 billion, or 1 per cent, of Singapore's gross domestic product, and employed more than 23,000 workers in 2016.

Dr Tan Wu Meng also asked for MTI's assessment of whether the country could be a hub for emerging technologies that can help companies slash their carbon footprint.

These include hydrogen - a fuel that produces no planet-warming carbon dioxide when burnt - and carbon capture, utilisation and storage.

Dr Tan See Leng said Singapore plans to use these technologies to help it meet the goal of reaching net-zero emissions. However, using hydrogen as a fuel comes with disadvantages, he added, including high storage and transportation costs.

As hydrogen is a gas with a boiling point far lower than that of natural gas, it is considered flammable and requires a "significant engineering challenge" to transport and store it in a commercially viable manner.

Singapore is looking into a few strategies to overcome this, Dr Tan See Leng said. These include transporting hydrogen as ammonia (which is a compound of hydrogen and nitrogen and comparatively easier to handle), liquefied hydrogen, or through liquid organic hydride carriers.

However, all come with challenges. For instance, liquid organic hydride carriers are less hydrogen-dense. "This means a relatively higher cargo footprint would be needed to import the same amount of hydrogen. The process required to release hydrogen from (these carriers) can also be landand energy-intensive," he added.

He said Singapore is keen to realise the decarbonisation potential of hydrogen and develop into a regional hydrogen hub.

"Government agencies will continue to monitor the technological and market developments to ensure that Singapore maintains its competitiveness," he added.

On carbon capture, Dr Tan See Leng said the country lacks known geological formations that are suitable for the permanent storage of carbon dioxide underground.

"We are therefore exploring partnerships with companies and other countries with suitable geological formations to enable carbon dioxide storage opportunities," he said.

As for carbon capture and utilisation, he added that the Republic is looking into converting carbon dioxide into waste-based feedstock or natural minerals that can be used to produce aggregates for reclamation or building materials.

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S'pore updating plan to lift competitiveness of marine and offshore engineering sector amid Covid-19 and climate change - The Straits Times

Australia has the potential to develop a substantial offshore wind energy industry from scratch, with abundant resources available near existing electricity substations across the continent, according to a new report.

The Blue Economy Cooperative Research Centre said Australia was yet to capitalise on significant offshore wind capacity despite the International Energy Agency nominating it as one of the big three likely sources of renewable energy globally alongside solar and onshore wind.

It found more than 2,000GW of offshore wind turbines far more than Australias existing generation capacity could be installed in areas within 100km of substations. Environmentally restricted and low-wind areas were excluded from the assessment.

Sites that have traditionally been electricity generation hubs, such as the Hunter and Latrobe valleys and Gladstone, were found to be particularly suitable as they were close to transmission grids and had strong offshore winds at times when solar and onshore wind output was limited.

Dr Chris Briggs, research director at the University of Technology Sydneys Institute for Sustainable Futures and a contributor to the report, said there had been a view in the energy industry that offshore wind energy would not play as significant a role in Australia as some other countries due to the availability of much cheaper solar and onshore wind energy.

He said that was starting to change as people recognised the scale of the clean energy transition required and what offshore wind could deliver. The combination of the scale, falling cost and the development of floating wind turbines means it has come into focus, he said.

Briggs said offshore wind could be built on a much larger scale than solar or onshore wind up to 2GW for a project and could generate more electricity per megawatt of capacity. This could be very valuable in the late 2020s and 2030s as we see coal plants retiring, he said.

The projects leader, Dr Mark Hemer of the CSIRO, said offshore wind could be particularly important under energy superpower scenarios that involved mass electrification of industry and transport and hydrogen production for domestic use and export.

The report said there were 10 offshore wind projects with a combined capacity of 25GW in development in Australia, all at an early stage. The most advanced is the $10bn Star of the South a 2.2GW windfarm planned for between 7km and 25km offshore in South Gippsland.

The federal government is yet to finalise the regulatory framework necessary for an offshore wind industry to develop. The report said it could help develop an industry by supporting the technology through the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, incorporating it into planning for the national hydrogen strategy, and considering allocation of marine space in commonwealth waters.

The work was partly funded by the maritime, electrical and manufacturing unions. They called on federal and state governments to take immediate steps to support the development of an industry, saying it had the potential to create jobs for workers in fossil fuel industries.

Paddy Crumlin, the national secretary of the Maritime Union of Australia, said the development of an offshore wind industry would give seafarers and offshore oil and gas workers an opportunity to transition into the important work of delivering Australias clean energy future.

Offshore wind is more advanced in countries with limited capacity to develop renewable energy on land. The report said 2030 targets for offshore wind energy totalled about 200GW, including 60GW in the European Union, 40GW in Britain and 12 GW in South Korea. Japan plans to reach 45GW by 2040.

Solar and onshore wind have grown substantially in recent years, leading to renewable energy providing nearly 30% of generation in the national electricity market. But the Morrison government also continues to support fossil fuels.

A report by BloombergNEF and Bloomberg Philanthropies this week found Australia increased support for fossil fuel by 48% between 2015 and 2019, the largest rise in the G20.

It said most of the support had been delivered in the form of tax breaks to oil and gas projects. They included tax capex deductions for mining and petroleum operations, fuel-tax credits and reductions in fuel-excise rates and offset schemes. Australia lost out on nearly US$6bn in foregone taxes over the five years, it said.

The Bloomberg report did not include the Morrison governments support for a gas-fired recovery from the pandemic. The government dedicated hundreds of millions of dollars to gas projects in the May budget, including up to $600m for a new power plant in the Hunter Valley that experts say is not needed.

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Australia has huge potential to develop offshore windfarms near existing substations, report says - The Guardian

For the past nine years, Tom Dameron has managed government relations for Surfside Foods, a New Jersey-based shellfish company. If you asked him five years ago what his biggest challenge was at work, the lifelong fisherman would have said negotiating annual harvest quotas for surf and quahog clams.

Today, hed tell you it is surviving the arrival of the offshore wind industry, which is slated to install hundreds of turbines atop prime fishing grounds over the next decade.

While there isnt a single wind turbine spinning off the coast of the Garden state yet, plans are under way for new offshore wind developments that hope to power more than a million homes with carbon-free energy over the next several years.

The wind farms are expected to create thousands of new jobs, but the price tag looks steep to Dameron, who fears those jobs and climate benefits will come at the expense of his industry. If wind lease areas are fully developed across the mid-Atlantic, Dameron said clam fishermen will lose access to highly productive areas of the ocean, which could send the multimillion-dollar industry into a downward spiral.

I could see the clam industry in Atlantic City disappearing, Dameron said.

Damerons fears are being echoed by fishermen across the country as they face the arrival of a big new energy business in waters many have fished for generations.

Offshore wind, which has long struggled to take off in the US due to high costs, regulatory uncertainty and fierce resistance from shoreside residents, is now surging forward under the Biden administration. In March, Joe Biden committed to building 30 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2030, enough to power 10m homes and avoid 78m metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

With strong political pressure to accelerate offshore wind development as part of the administrations larger effort to tackle the climate crisis, fishermen feel they are being forgotten. Many say that their concerns which range from safety issues operating around wind farms to how offshore wind development will alter the ocean environment and affect fish stocks arent being meaningfully considered by regulators.

Offshore wind is one of the most consistently cited factors as a big risk to businesses and their practices, said Annie Hawkins, the executive director of the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (Roda), a trade association representing commercial fishermen. It is a huge, huge thing in the minds of fishermen right now.

While the European offshore wind industry has grown rapidly in recent years, with more than 5,000 turbines generating a combined 25 gigawatts of renewable power capacity as of earlier this year, America has lagged behind. Today, the entire US offshore wind fleet consists of five turbines in state waters off Rhode Island and two research turbines in federal waters off Virginia.

Over the coming decades, the US is expected to catch up by installing thousands of additional turbines in lease areas spanning thousands of square miles of ocean. American fishermen are bracing for the sorts of spatial conflicts that have arisen in Europe, where fishermen are often legally forbidden to operate in the vicinity of wind farms and subsea cables, or have stopped operating in their vicinity by choice due to safety and liability concerns.

In the north-eastern US and mid-Atlantic, where Americas first commercial wind farms will be built, lease areas overlap with highly productive fisheries that add billions of dollars to regional economies. While the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) hasnt declared any of these wind energy areas off-limits for fishing, as in Europe fishermen worry that turbines and their associated infrastructure, including seafloor transmission cables and concrete foundations, will make it impossible to operate their vessels safely.

What essentially this is turning into is thousands of miles of closed areas, said Meghan Lapp, the general manager at Seafreeze Shoreside, a Rhode Island-based fish plant

Along the US west coast, where floating offshore wind technology is expected to be deployed because of the much greater depth to seafloor, suspended transmission cables could impede fishing nets and create a functional closure for certain types of gear, said Mike Conroy, the executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermens Associations (PCFFA).

If fishing gear does become entangled with offshore wind equipment that is an extremely dangerous situation in terms of sinking a boat or loss of life, said Daphne Munroe, a shellfish ecologist at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Wind turbines can also interfere with the radar systems fishermen use to navigate.

Fishermen have additional concerns about how commercial-scale offshore wind development will affect fish stocks and the ocean environment. Noise from the construction and operation of wind turbines could potentially drive fish away, while undersea foundations risk becoming artificial reefs that alter the distribution of species in wind lease areas. Wind turbines may also alter ocean currents in a way that affects the mid-Atlantic cold pool, a vast area of cold water near the seafloor that allows numerous species, including scallops, clams and flounder, to thrive.

The large-scale, long-term environmental impacts of offshore wind have not been well researched in US waters, and the types of studies needed to address these questions are expensive, said Aran Mooney, a biologist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.

There is an OK amount of research funding going into this, but there certainly needs to be more to get at these bigger questions, Mooney said.

To reach the Biden administrations goal of expanding offshore wind development, BOEM is moving quickly to review and approve offshore wind farms in federal waters, identify new ocean areas for wind energy development, and hold lease sales. By 2025, the agency aims to have completed an environmental review of at least 16 offshore wind farm construction and operations plans.

The pace of offshore wind development is going fast relative to the scale of research on these topics, said Travis Miles, an oceanographer at Rutgers University who is exploring the potential impacts of offshore wind on the mid-Atlantic cold pool. And it would be really unfortunate to leave our fishing industry behind

BOEM marine biologist Brian Hooker said in an email that since 2009, the agency had awarded millions of dollars for fisheries-related research in the Atlantic on topics ranging from how fish migrate through lease areas to how they are affected by artificial sounds and electromagnetic fields. In its fiscal year 2022-2023 research plan, BOEM proposed a new study to investigate the spatial needs of the commercial clam industry in the New York Bight, a heavily fished area between New Jersey and Long Island where the agency will be holding an offshore wind lease sale this year.

The agencys proposed sale notice for the New York Bight, released in June, also contains several provisions aimed at helping fishermen. These include a proposal for 2.5-mile-wide fishing vessel transit lanes in the proposed Hudson South lease area and a requirement that wind developers coordinate with the fishing industry and consider any potential conflicts when developing construction and operation plans.

Some offshore wind developers are attempting to address fishing industry concerns. Drawing on its experience working with the commercial fishing industry overseas, developer Equinor held a series of meetings with fishermen as it was planning Empire Wind, a proposed offshore wind farm south of Long Island. Based on feedback it received during those meetings, Equinor redesigned the layout for the wind farm to include an open area for fishing at the western edge of the lease area.

Equinor met us halfway and negotiated something that would work well for everybody, said Hawkins, who co-organized the meetings and attended them on behalf of Roda.

In recent years in Europe, many spatial conflicts have been avoided by this sort of collaborative planning. But right now, Hawkins said that meaningful negotiations between offshore wind developers and fishermen in US waters the exception rather than the norm. From our perspective weve seen less authentic engagement with fishermen since the start of the Biden administration, Hawkins said. It certainly has the appearance of [developers] thinking theyre going to be all right no matter what.

Hooker said that BOEM will continue to engage with commercial fishermen to avoid or reduce potential impacts from offshore wind energy development. BOEM, he said, works with the US coast guard and others at all stages of offshore wind development to determine how navigation and fishing will be impacted, and the agency tries to avoid leasing the most heavily trafficked parts of the ocean.

But according to Hawkins: The fishing industry feels very strongly that they still do not have a meaningful voice in the process nor an authentic seat at the table.

Excerpt from:

I can see the industry disappearing: US fishermen sound alarm at plans for offshore wind - The Guardian

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VIANA DO CASTELO, Portugal The fortunes of the Portuguese port city of Viana do Castelo have always been tied to the ocean.

During the 16th century, the port became a primary launch point for explorers and merchants seeking new trade routes. The harbor later became a hub for fishermen and merchant vessels sailing to the country's colonial possessions in Africa and Asia.

Now, a burgeoning offshore wind sector stands to transform Viana's economy yet again. This time, the hope is to turn the port into a major renewable power hub and a key player in the EU's green energy future.

Some of that potential can already be seen from the city's coastline, where clear days offer up a glimpse of the three massive turbines that make up the floating wind farm known as WindFloat Atlantic.

The structure is anchored 20 kilometers off the coast along a stretch of the Atlantic known for its strong winds and ferocious storms. Last year, the floating technology became the first of its kind to be tested in EU waters.

"This project represents what's next for Europe," said Jos Pinheiro, country manager for Southern Europe at Ocean Winds, one of the companies involved in the joint-venture scheme.

"Until now, offshore wind farms have been limited to shallow waters, but by mounting the turbines on floating platforms that are anchored to the seabed, we're taking advantage of much stronger wind flows."

The project "proves that floating offshore is viable in Atlantic waters," he added. "That's hugely important for Europe given how much of the continent has very deep waters near the coastline."

Anchored at a depth of 100 meters, the turbines have an installed capacity of 25 megawatts (MW) roughly equivalent to the energy consumed by 60,000 homes in one year.

Brussels is hoping that a rapid ramp-up of this kind of floating infrastructure will help the bloc meet its objective of expanding the12 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind capacity it had in 2020 to at least 60 GW by 2030 and 300 GW by 2050.

By hosting a pioneer project, the city of Viana stands to play a major part in that rollout by focusing on the production of wind energy components and using its port to ship them around the bloc.

"We've now gained the know-how that other countries don't have, both in terms of production and administrative procedures related to this kind of project," said Pinheiro. "There's enormous production potential here."

Floating technology would enable Portugal to become a leader in the offshore wind sector, which up until now had only taken off in countries with shallow waters off their coastlines, according to Pinheiro.

"This is a game-changer for countries with thousands of kilometers of coastlines but rather deep waters," he said, adding that the technology was already generating enormous excitement in Spain, Italy and Greece, where a number of different floating offshore schemes are in the works.

Pinheiro said the sector would help create new jobs and rehabilitate ports where carbon-heavy industrial activities are being phased out.

The Portuguese government, too, is banking on an expansion of offshore renewable energy as part of its efforts not only to reach climate targets but to boost its post-pandemic recovery.

"There's huge potential for creating new, highly-paid, quality jobs in this sector," Portuguese Minister of the Sea Ricardo Serro Santos told POLITICO in an interview. "In Viana, we can see the expansion of offshore driving growth potential in dockyards, in the metallurgic sector ... But this applies to all of Portugal, and we are eager to see the further development of this technology."

While land-bound wind farms, and even some anchored offshore wind turbines, have been met with local protests in some parts of Europe, floating structures have so far proven to be less contentious. That's partly because they're located far away from shore, meaning campaigners are less worried about towers marring the ocean landscape, according to Pinheiro.

"We also made sure to engage with the local fishermen's associations and engaged with them during the public consultation periods to make sure that they were also satisfied," he said.

Lus Ceia, president of the Business Confederation of the Alto Minho region, said local residents have reacted positively to the new offshore structures as well.

"There's a lot of excitement over what green energy can mean for us, and political and business leaders are working together to be proactive," he said. "We want to bring in jobs that take advantage of our natural resources, that are good for the environment, and that mean better working conditions in our region."

German wind energy giant Enercom is already a major employer for locals in the area. Its Viana hub, initially focused on domestic demand, has become a major exporter to foreign markets and has made use of the port to ship its turbines around the world.

Pinheiro predicted the floating offshore hub would build on that success. "This port has always determined our city's existence," he said. "We've suffered when it's entered periods of decline, but we've flourished when it's functioned well."

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Portuguese port city gets second act as offshore wind hub - POLITICO.eu

Torrential floods ravaging Europe and China and infernal heat and forest fires in the North American northwest and Siberia added new urgency to the need to shift away from climate change-fuelling fossil power production around the world as the COP26 conference looms.

Will hydrogen be the skeleton key to unlock a carbon-neutral world? Subscribe to Accelerate Hydrogen, powered by Recharge and Upstream, and get the market insight you need for this rapidly evolving global market. Sign up here free

New calculations from BloombergNEF spelled out afresh the giant capital shift that is needed to get on track to meet Paris Agreement pledges: $173trn, the analyst said, will have to be invested worldwide in renewable energy projects and infrastructure if international net-zero targets are to be reached by 2050. This would necessitate increasing current annual spend of $1.7trn a year to $3.1-$5.8trn on average over the next three decades.

The wind industry put its voice behind its collective readiness to lead from the front in the gearing up of renewables deployment. In an open letter to the G20 group of nations, CEOs from companies including turbine makers Siemens Gamesa and Vestas and major utilities Orsted, RWE and EDPR along with wind power associations across the world from China, Europe, Latin America and Africa urged a step-up in the ambition to meet international climate goals by tapping much more into wind power than current plans foresee.

As Recharge reported in an exclusive interview with Enel CEO Francesco Starace, the Italian island of Sardinia is on its way to being among the first places in the world to reach net-zero emissions as early as 2030 after Italian minister for ecological transition, Roberto Cingolani, announced plans to make the Mediterranean's second-largest island "the greenest territory in Europe.

Japan this week laid out ambitions to drive up the share of renewables in its power mix to more than one third by the end of the decade under a draft energy plan, but analysts were quick to raise concerns the worlds third-largest economy would be able enact a vision of getting 36-38% of its power from wind and solar by 2030, increasing a former goal of 22-24% and up from about 18% in 2019.

The leading role offshore wind power is destined to play in the island nation reaching these targets was apparent in announcements from engineering conglomerate JFE that it would build Japans first offshore wind foundation plant, a key boost to plans to develop a local supply base for its coming build-out of turbines at sea, and later in the week from turbine giant Vestas, which unrolled blueprints for a nacelle assembly facility in the country.

The biggest news out of Japan this week, of course, came from the Olympic stadia, which though largely empty due to pandemic restrictions were set to see first events action. The games had heavily promoted its green credentials, billing itself as the Hydrogen Olympics, but organisers of the have had to significantly scale back their original plans for the widespread use of the clean-burning gas. Despite the reduced use of hydrogen, a Tokyo games spokesperson told Recharge: After the Games, the area will serve as a model for the realisation of a hydrogen society.

Hydrogen, hydrogen everywhere as is increasingly the case on the Recharge frontpage and this week was on-trend. Producing large amounts of green hydrogen from surplus wind and solar power and using it as energy storage will be vital to keeping electricity costs low in future power grids dominated by variable renewable energy, according to a new scientific study funded by Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates venture capital firm Gates Ventures.

The European Union believes, seeing the Swiss army knife of the energy transition as a key tool in reaching its goal of producing 50% of heavy industry's hydrogen from renewables sources by 2030. However, as Renewable Hydrogen Coalition impact director Franois Paquet wrote in an exclusive column for Recharge, though doubtless a game-changer, green hydrogen still needs government support instruments to make it viable.

Construction of 10bn ($14bn) floating wind-powered hydrogen projects, such as Cerulean Winds North Sea 3GW scheme that promises to power an onshore hydrogen plant that will help decarbonise coastal industry as well as halve current greenhouse gas emissions from UKs offshore oil & gas operations by 2025 will help the cause. The megadevelopment onboard its second delivery partner last week, the Px Group, which operates industrial facilities including the giant St Fergus gas terminal in Scotland.

And while we are on the subject, do join the thousands already signed up to receive our weekly Accelerate Hydrogen e-newsletter and delve deeper into this revolutionary industrial sector.

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The $173trn energy transition spend, Japan's offshore cross-drafts, and hydrogen on a high | Recharge - Recharge

Atlantic Shores Offshore Winds array of 111 turbines will be built in the southernmost portion of the companys federal lease, 12 miles off Absecon Inlet, and probably will not be visible to Long Beach Island visitors during the summer tourist season. This was the upshot of a virtual open house held Tuesday, July 13.

The open house consisted of a number of virtual rooms that participants could click on and enter on such subjects as visibility, environment, development and timeline, project design and technology, fishing and navigation. Participants had three chances to hear an entire 20-minute presentation on the topics or jump from room to room to gather what information snippets they could.

Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind, a project between EDF Renewables and Shell New Energies, received the ability to develop 1,510 megawatts of electricity from the New Jersey Bureau of Public Utilities on June 30, which brought it one step closer to creating a wind farm on the 183,353 acres of the Continental Shelf it leases from the federal Department of the Interior, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. The company announced where it will develop the array of wind turbines, and it is far from LBI shores.

The timeline for development started this year when ASOW presented its construction and operations plan to BOEM. BOEM will issue a draft environmental impact statement for public review and comment next year, with the final environmental impact statement and BOEM approval anticipated in 2023. In 2024, Atlantic Shores will begin onshore construction of 13 miles of transmission cables to the existing Cardiff electric substation in Egg Harbor Township, Atlantic County, with routes following roadways and burrowing under wetlands and marshes. Offshore turbine construction should begin in 2025, and ASOW plans to deliver renewable energy to New Jersey residents beginning in 2027.

The turbine array whose towers and blade wing span will stretch 800 to 900 feet above the water will be located in a grid pattern and spaced a nautical mile apart from east to west and 0.6 miles from north to south. The development in a grid pattern is to make navigation through the farm easier. There will be three or four offshore substations built, but these will be within the grid pattern and not be a barrier to navigation. There will be temporary impacts to navigation during construction; these will be communicated to mariners through digital charts.

Fishing will be allowed within the wind farm. There may be impacts to the surf clam industry; Rutgers University is doing a baseline study on surf clams and quahogs. Collision impacts to birds seem low, according to studies done in Europe. Studies of the threatened red knot shorebirds migration are being completed, and results will be sent to BOEM for the environmental impact study. To protect the endangered Atlantic right whale, construction or pile driving of turbine mono-poles will be halted between January and April, when the whales are most frequently seen in the area.

As for visibility from shore, another study done by Rutgers taking into account summer conditions of hot and hazy, moisture-laden air, found that on only one out of every four or five days would the turbines be visible to beaches in Atlantic City.

Another answer to a question posed by a participant on location was that BOEM chose the areas to lease taking into consideration navigation and habitats combined with the states need for energy and the threat of climate change to habitats. If the wind farms were located farther offshore, not as much electricity would be available.

According to one speaker from ASOW, New Jersey is seeing climate warming and sea rise faster than the rest of the Northeast. The implementation of the total build-out of its lease would result in the annual decrease of 4 million tons of carbon released into the atmosphere.

The construction and operations plan that is now in the hands of the BOEM will be released to the public in October. More information is available on the Atlantic Shores website, atlanticshoreswind.com.

Pat Johnson

patjohnson@thesandpaper.net

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Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind Array Will Steer Clear of LBI for Now - The SandPaper

Multi-cloud technology services provider Rackspace Technology this week unveiled restructuring that will result in the laying off of about 10 percent of the companys workforce.

San Antonio, Texas-based Rackspace said it is investing between $65 million and $70 million to re-align resources towards fast-growing product and services offerings, including towards cloud services focused on such initiatives as cloud migration, elastic engineering, cloud-native application development, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and security services.

However, the company said in a Thursday regulatory filing, about 10 percent of its workforce are expected to be laid off, with about 85 percent of those roles slated to be replaced via Rackspaces offshore service centers.

[Related: Rackspace Again A Public Company After Disappointing IPO]

Nearly all the impacted employees were notified Wednesday, and are slated to leave over the next 12 months.

Rackspace estimated the restructuring plan will result in about $70 million to $80 million in expenses over the next 12 to 24 months, primarily in the next 12 months. Those include termination benefits to the affected employees including severance payments, healthcare benefits, and other exit costs, along with other expenses related to one-time offshore build out costs, asset write-offs, professional fees, and expected investments in automation and technology.

Rackspace expects the restructuring plan to generate about $95 million to $100 million in gross annual savings, which is expected to fund the $65 million to $70 million resource alignment.

A Rackspace spokesperson, responding to a CRN request for further information, said via email that the layoffs and investment are part of a strategic initiative related to the expanding multi-cloud market opportunity, an opportunity which has accelerated recently because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Rackspace restructuring will fuel the companys multi-cloud restructuring and investment, including investments in new service development efforts, additional delivery capabilities, go-to-market enhancements, and expansion of best-shoring centers of excellence, the spokesperson said.

At the same time, the spokesperson said, Rackspace is continuing to hire new employees to accelerate its business, and has over 700 open roles worldwide to join its global workforce of more than 7,000 employees, also known as Rackers.

The company last year reported $2.7 billion in revenue with a net loss of $245.8 million. In its first quarter this year, which ended March 31, Rackspace Technology reported revenue of $726 million, an increase of 11 percent from the same quarter the year before, and a steeper net loss of $64 million than a year ago in the same period. The firm will announce its second quarter financial results August 11.

In June 2020, the company rebranded from Rackspace to Rackspace Technology.

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Rackspace Laying Off 10 Percent Of Workforce, With Offshore Plans For Most - CRN

This week, the Ninth Circuit resolves a split among trial courts about the application of California labor laws on drilling platforms on the Outer Continental Shelf.

IAFETA MAUIA V. PETROCHEM INSULATION, INC.

The Court holds that California labor laws requiring meal and rest breaks do not apply on the Outer Continental Shelf under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act because federal law already addresses those issues.

Panel: Judges Murguia, Christen, and Lynn (N.D. Tex.), with Judge Christen writing the opinion.

Key Highlight: The fact that federal law does not provide meal- and rest-period protections as robust as Californias does not mean that there is a gap in federal law or that federal law does not address meal and rest periods. The result we reach here is consistent with [the Supreme Courts decision in] Parker Drilling, which made clear that state law plays only a limited role on the OCS.

Background: Iafeta Mauia worked twelve hour shifts as a scaffolding supervisor on oil platforms on the Outer Continental Shelf off the coast of California. His employer, Petrochem, provided one meal period after six hours, and two rest periods per twelve-hour shift. Mauia filed suit, alleging that those practices violated California labor law, which requires 30-minute meal breaks at least every five hours, and 10 minutes of rest for every four hours worked. Petrochem moved to dismiss because, under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, state law only applies on the OCS to the extent that federal law has left a gap. California labor law was thus inapplicable, Petrochem argued, because the federal Fair Labor Standards Act already addressed meal and rest periods. The district court disagreed, reasoning that federal law concerned only when breaks must be compensated as work time, not whether employers must provide them. Recognizing that other trial courts had reached a different result, the district court certified interlocutory appeal.

Result: The Ninth Circuit reversed. The Court first explained that OCSLA adopts state law on the Outer Continental Shelf to the extent it is applicable and not inconsistent with . . . Federal law. Under the Supreme Courts decision in Parker Drilling Mgmt. Servs. v. Newton, 139 S. Ct. 1881 (2019), the question is whether federal law has already addressed the relevant issue; if so, state law addressing the same issue would necessarily be inconsistent with existing federal law and cannot be adopted as surrogate federal law. Next, the Court walked through the FLSAs implementing regulations, concluding that federal law encourages, but does not require, that employers provide rest breaks and requires employers to compensate employees for any rest breaks that are provided. Because those rules expressly contemplate meal and rest periods, address how and when these periods must be compensated as work time, and provide a remedy to employees whose employers fail to comply, the Court held that there is no gap in federal law for state law to fill, and thus the California labor code provisions Mauia invoked did not apply. The fact that federal law does not provide meal- and rest-period protections as robust as Californias does not mean that there is a gap in federal law. And it did not matter that there was no direct federal counterparts to the California rules because the relevant inquiry is whether federal law addresses the relevant issue, not whether federal law addresses it in the same way.

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This Week at the Ninth: Offshore Occupation | Morrison & Foerster LLP - Left Coast Appeals - JDSupra - JD Supra

DUBLIN, July 22, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Global Offshore Decommissioning Market by Service (Well Plugging & Abandonment, Platform Removal, Conductor Removal) Depth (Shallow, Deepwater) Structure (Topsides, Substructure) Removal (Leave in Place, Partial, Complete), and Region - Forecast to 2027" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global offshore decommissioning market is projected to reach USD 8 billion by 2027 from an estimated USD 5.2 billion in 2021, at a CAGR of 7.4% during the forecast period.

The factors driving the market include maturing oil & gas fields, low crude oil prices, and aging offshore infrastructure. Offshore decommissioning refers to ending oil & gas operations on offshore platforms and restoring marine life and seafloor to its pre-production conditions.

Well plugging & abandonment segment dominates the global market

The well plugging & abandonment segment is expected to be the largest market, by service type during the forecast period. This growth is evident owing to key activity to be performed regardless of decommissioning type; it ensures that oil wells do not have any type of leakage after the cessation of production. According to norms and regulations, wells that are matured and no longer productive need to be properly plugged & abandoned. It is essential to plug the wells before platform removal to prevent any kind of leakages, which can pollute the seafloor and damage the surrounding marine environment.

Complete removal dominate the global offshore decommissioning market

The complete removal segment of offshore decommissioning is estimated to be the largest market during the forecast period. Complete removal involves restoring the oilfield site to its natural or pre-commissioning state. It is an expensive decommissioning option for both operating companies and taxpayers. In the North Sea, a complete removal is currently required by the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic, or the 'OSPAR' agreement.

Europe to lead the global offshore decommissioning market in terms of growth rate

Europe is the largest market, by value, for offshore decommissioning, followed by North America. Owing to mature oil and gas fields, particularly in the UK and the North Sea. The impending cessation of production in major oil and gas fields would ensure that the European market would grow at the highest pace. Europe is estimated to witness the highest offshore decommissioning spending, with its well-developed regulatory framework compared to other regions.

Key Topics Covered:

1 Introduction

2 Research Methodology

3 Executive Summary

4 Premium Insights4.1 Attractive Opportunities in Offshore Decommissioning Market4.2 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Region4.3 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Service4.4 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Structure4.5 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Depth4.6 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Removal4.7 Offshore Decommissioning Market in Europe, by Structure & Country

5 Market Overview5.1 Introduction5.2 COVID-19 Health Assessment5.3 Road to Recovery5.4 COVID-19 Economic Assessment5.5 Market Dynamics5.5.1 Drivers5.5.1.1 Growing Number of Abandoned Wells and Presence of Large Mature Offshore Oilfields Worldwide5.5.1.2 Fluctuations in Oil Prices Boost Offshore Decommissioning Activities5.5.2 Restraints5.5.2.1 High Cost Associated with Offshore Decommissioning Processes5.5.2.2 Lack of Skilled Workers in Developing Countries5.5.2.3 Environmental Concerns Associated with Offshore Decommissioning5.5.3 Opportunities5.5.3.1 Aging Offshore Infrastructures, Especially in North Sea and Gulf of Mexico5.5.3.2 Deepwater Discovery and Development in Offshore Areas5.5.4 Challenges5.5.4.1 Growing Adoption of Technologies to Increase Production from Mature Fields5.5.4.2 Impact of COVID-19 on Offshore Decommissioning Spending5.6 Trends/Disruptions Impacting Customers' Businesses5.6.1 Revenue Shift and New Revenue Pockets in Offshore Decommissioning Market5.7 Supply Chain Overview5.7.1 Key Influencers5.7.1.1 EPC Companies5.7.1.2 Service Providers5.7.1.3 Operators5.8 Market Map5.9 Technology Analysis5.10 Patent Analysis5.11 Offshore Decommissioning Market: Regulations5.12 Porter's Five Forces Analysis5.13 Case Study Analysis

6 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Service Type6.1 Introduction6.2 Project Management, Engineering, and Planning6.2.1 Project Management, Engineering, and Planning Phase of Decommissioning Can Start as Early as 2-3 Years Prior to Cessation of Production6.3 Permitting & Regulatory Compliance6.3.1 Middle East & Africa is Among Fastest Markets in Following Regulatory Compliance6.4 Platform Preparation6.4.1 Platform Preparation Helps in Reducing Offshore Decommissioning Costs and Time6.5 Well Plugging & Abandonment6.5.1 Increasing Investments in Well Plugging & Abandonment are Driving Market6.6 Conductor Removal6.6.1 Growing Emphasis on Safety is Expected to Drive Market for Conductor Removal Segment During Forecast Period6.7 Mobilization & Demobilization of Derrick Barges6.7.1 Rising Need for Economical and Safe Transportation of Structures to Onshore Locations is Expected to Drive Market During Forecast Period 916.8 Platform Removal6.8.1 North Sea and Gulf of Mexico are Home to Maximum Number of Platforms, Which are Ideal and Not Producing Any Type of Hydrocarbons and Eligible for Decommissioning6.9 Pipeline & Power Cable Decommissioning6.9.1 Ageing Offshore Infrastructures are Estimated to Drive Market for this Segment During Forecast Period6.10 Material Disposal6.10.1 Rising Need for Safe Disposal and Recycling of Structure is Expected to Propel Market Growth During Forecast Period6.11 Site Clearance6.11.1 Availability of Regulatory Framework Guides Operating Companies to Conduct Their Site Clearance in Environmentally Safe Manner

7 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Structure7.1 Introduction7.2 Topsides7.2.1 Growing Number of Projects & Investments for Topside Removal is Expected to Drive Market During Forecast Period7.3 Substructure7.3.1 Increasing Substructure Decommissioning Activities in North Sea are Driving Market During Forecast Period7.4 Subsea Infrastructure7.4.1 Aging Subsea Equipment and Infrastructure are Expected to Boost Market Growth

8 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Depth8.1 Introduction8.2 Shallow Water8.2.1 Shallow Water Projects are 30-40 Years Old and Hence Need to be Decommissioned8.3 Deepwater8.3.1 Increasing Need to Decommission Abandoned Wells in Deepwater Areas is Driving Market

9 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Removal9.1 Introduction9.2 Complete Removal9.2.1 Safety Concerns Regarding Marine Life are Expected to Drive Market for Complete Removal Segment During Forecast Period9.3 Partial Removal9.3.1 Government Policies in US Gulf of Mexico are Driving Market for this Segment9.4 Leave in Place9.4.1 Leave in Place Removal Requires No Site Clearance and Provides Migratory Animal Habitat, Which is Estimated to Boost Market Growth for this Segment

10 Offshore Decommissioning Market, by Region

11 Competitive Landscape

12 Company Profiles12.1 Key Companies12.1.1 Halliburton12.1.2 Petrofac12.1.3 Oceaneering International12.1.4 Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V.12.1.5 Aker Solutions12.1.6 Schlumberger12.1.7 Baker Hughes Company12.1.8 TechnipFMC12.1.9 Subsea 712.1.10 Weatherford12.1.11 Saipem12.1.12 John Wood Group plc12.1.13 AF Gruppen12.1.14 Heerema Marine Contractors12.1.15 Allseas Group12.2 Other Companies12.2.1 Deepocean Group12.2.2 Acteon Group12.2.3 Maersk Decom12.2.4 Able UK12.2.5 Mactech Offshore

13 Appendix

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/fhdhid

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The Worldwide Offshore Decommissioning Industry is Expected to Reach $8 Billion by 2027 at a CAGR of 7.4% from 2021 - PRNewswire