By 2030, the UK expects to see floating offshore wind turbines in the Celtic Seas. Each unit has the potential to have a rotor diameter of over 250 metres, and substructures could range in size between 60x60m to 100x100m in size. This build-out is critical to meet the demand for net zero and to improve the nation’s energy security. The demand for floating offshore wind turbines has rapidly increased over recent years due to the fact that 80% of available offshore wind energy is in deeper waters, and floating wind technology has advanced significantly. ABP is the UK’s leading ports group with a network of 21 ports across the UK. ABP handles around one-quarter of the nation's seaborne trade, contributing £7.5 billion to the economy every year and supporting 119,000 jobs. ABP also operates one of the UK's busiest rail terminals at Hams Hall in the Midlands. Port Talbot is one of the only harbours in the UK capable of handling cape-size vessels of up to 170,000dwt. The port handles around 6.6 million tonnes of cargo every year and over £760 million of trade. As well as supporting steel production in South Wales, the port handles project and heavy-lift cargoes, steel and other metals, building aggregates and cargoes to support the offshore energy sector. Floating wind developments will be additional to the Port’s current capacity. To meet the anticipated demand, the offshore wind industry will require large scale engineering and assembly facilities. ABP is planning to adapt the existing deep-water facility at Port Talbot to meet the floating offshore wind needs of the Celtic Sea. Given the scale of engineering involved, the ability to reliably crane (if a crane is utilised), manoeuvre and serial fabricate foundations will be essential to guarantee volumes and load-outs. The assembly of floating offshore wind turbines is completed at the quayside within a port and towed to its final site location by tugboats and anchor handling vessels. Given the increased size and weight of these units, ABP is reaching out to the innovation community to find new ideas for developing the port facility for lifting/launching floating platforms into the water to be ready for further assembly. The main considerations for any solution proposed will largely depend on; The size and weight of each of the final units from the floating platform designer, The impact of the rise and fall of the tide, which is significant within the Port Talbot area. As yet, sites that would likely use Port Talbot have not chosen their floating foundation designs. A successful applicant will need to understand different floating platform technologies and demonstrate that the proposed design can accommodate them. The challenge is split into two constituent parts: Stage 1 is to launch the floating platform from the quayside to the water and Stage 2 is to manage the platform once it is floating and to enable quick, safe and cost-effective turbine assembly: Challenge (1) (Found here) calls for a floating platform launch method that will move the platform from the quayside to the water. This Challenge (Challenge 2) calls for management of the floating platforms once afloat in the harbour and delivery of a subsequent wind turbine assembly process on these platforms. The images below provide a birdseye view of Port Talbot now and a plan view of what ABP has suggested for the site to 2050. ABP are looking for potential solutions for these challenges so that they can be part of the design for this future port. Rewards & Benefits Successful applicants will be given an opportunity to pitch their idea to ABP. If applicant designs are successful beyond this, they may take the design concept through to contractual full design and involvement in the port construction project. The package may also include: Support from Innovate UK KTN Support in the development of a prototype or pilot Technical support Invitation to attend or present at Innovate UK KTN events A potential business collaboration Investor introductions (if investment is required) Support if any Innovate or similar competitions are relevant Functional Requirements The image below is a graphic design of what a future port facility could look like. This is only one idea and is provided to help visualise the challenges outlined. ABP would welcome new approaches and ideas to those proposed in this image. The floating platforms used in this image may not be the same as those finally chosen by a wind farm project developer. ABP seeks a way to manage the floating platform while it is afloat and a turbine installation method that will be suitable for the floating platform, while at the quayside. The solution must seek to minimise assembly cost and time. After the floating platform is launched into the water, it would need to be secured. The turbine will then need to be assembled and installed onto the floating platform near the quayside, ready for towing out to sea. Wind turbine components would include the tower sections, nacelles and blades. The present expectation is to do this in the port area or nearby so that components from the lay-up area can easily be transported to the point of final assembly. Turbine assembly methods must consider a 10-metre tidal range and the effect this will have on the floating platforms. Any angle of entry which may put strain on the floating structures must also be considered. There may be an opportunity to define the launch methods alongside platform designers. It is possible that a lot of the heavier components will arrive by ship, which will be unloaded to the quayside and stored in the layup area, before being brought forward for assembly and launch. It would also be important for applicants to consider the components arriving by sea that require quayside lifting. Components would need to be ready for moving to the assembly process or from the ship to the sea, so that they can be assembled while floating. The applicant may wish to consider floating pontoons and solutions that make cranage easier to manage. Keeping all components stable during assembly is crucial because the tide can cause substantial horizontal, vertical and axial movement of structures. Technical Requirements The quayside would need to consider a 45-tonne axle weight for the Self-Propelled Modular Transporters (SPMT). The floating platform may be up to 80x80 metres and could weigh around 3,000 – 6,000 tonnes each, with concrete designs in the region of 12,000 – 15,000 tonnes each (or up to 20,000t). The current design for the quay gives a water depth minimum of 12m at Chart Datum (CD). At high tide, this could rise to 22m. The seabed is made up of soft clay in the shallower areas with consolidated fine-grained sand and silt in deeper areas. Port Talbot has a dredged pocket of 17m to CD. The 1st development phase will create over 300,000m2 of layup space that will accommodate both turbine and floating platform activities. All turbine components would likely require lifting separately from the quayside onto the floating platform and are summarised as follows: Turbine blades are likely to be over 100m in length and have a mass of over 40 tonnes. Turbine towers (built-in sections and bolted together) are about 100m long, with a base diameter of 7-8m and have a mass of over 600 tonnes Turbine nacelles are about 20-25m long x 9-12m wide x 7-9m high, with a mass of over 500 tonnes including the hub. All lifting must either compensate or take into account, the rise and fall of the tide to ensure that there is no danger to workers on the site through miss handling and no risk of damage to the components as they are lowered into place. Deployment Timescale Launch of the Competition: 19/05/22 Deadline for applications: 15/07/22 Selection and notification of finalists: 05/08/22 Date of Pitch day: TBC (08/22) Solutions should be fully deployable to allow ABP to reach operation circa 2026/27 Cost Requirement & Market Opportunity The entire development of the Port Talbot facility will stretch into the hundreds of millions. Out of Scope AB Ports would welcome alternative solutions to the proposed challenges, but any alternative approach must be practical and sensitive to commercial drivers. It welcomes new ideas and approaches to the assumptions that have been made. Eligibility & Assessment Criteria Entrants to this competition must be: Established businesses, startups, SMEs or individual entrepreneurs UK based or have the intention to set up a UK base Applications will be assessed on: Relevance to the topic Innovative nature of the subject Coherence of the proposed business model Feasibility/ economic viability Development potential Maturity of project/solution Ability to launch project quickly/Ease of implementation Price/quality ratio Suitability for the UK and European Market IP & Potential Commercial Route Existing background IP associated with a potential solution will remain with Solution Provider(s). Where any new IP generation is envisaged, it will be subject to the mutual IP agreement of the Solution Provider(s) and Innovation Challenger. Any commercial deployment of a transferred solution or newly developed solution, through licensing, joint venture, partnership or direct investment, will be subject to the commercial agreement between the Solution Provider(s) and Innovation Challenger. Where necessary, a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) may be signed to uphold confidentiality in the engagement between the Solution Provider(s) and Innovation Challenger. (This would be expected to be after company selection, it is suggested that details of IP be not disclosed, Focus on the outcomes of the technology proposed). UKRI and Innovate UK KTN do not take any share of IP ownership or enter into commercial ventures through the iX programme. Benefit For a successful applicant, the potential reward would be a contract to take the initial idea through to full design and involvement in redevelopment of the harbour. Next Steps If this is of interest to you, please CONNECT through konfer, we are open to any and all discussions and welcome your interest.