Fugro Renewables on Show at EWEA

There is also news of a successful foundation installation for wave energy devices. Furthermore, with an eye on the growing German offshore wind sector, Fugro Renewables has now opened an office in Hamburg, Germany.

According to Tony Hodgson, Fugro's Global Business Development Manager - Renewable Energy, the location, foundation design, cabling and installation of offshore wind farms require specialist knowledge, skilled people, fit-for-purpose vessels and dedicated equipment able to operate in challenging environments.

In the first quarter of 2013, Fugro in The Netherlands will take delivery of a new-built vessel, M/V Fugro Pioneer, the first of Fugro's offshore survey costal vessel series. Designed to Fugro specifications and fitted with the latest survey equipment, these are the most advanced vessels of their type. The new vessel will be able to carry out the full range of site and route survey tasks to obtain the high-resolution data necessary for safe, efficient and cost-effective planning, design and engineering activities for the installation of wind turbines and other seabed structures such as pipelines, platforms, and manifolds.

Fugro and Soil Machine Dynamics (SMD) have developed a high-performance, modular jet trenching and mechanical cutting system. The Q1400 system will be available early in 2012 for the marine renewable and offshore oil and gas markets. It offers a tracked trenching system capable of free flying and operating in water depths of up to 3,000m. It is capable of performing high quality jet trenching in soils of up to 1,000KPA, and mechanical chain cutting soils of up to 250KPA.

Fugro has successfully completed a positional and depth of burial survey on electrical power cables at a 500 MW offshore wind farm located in the southern sector of the North Sea, off the Suffolk coast. The surveyed cables included the offshore interconnector cable between two offshore stations and the main export cable back to shore.

Fugro began a programme of investigations around the north and west coast of France in summer 2011 in support of pre-bid analysis for the country's first major offshore wind farm licensing round.

Fugro has completed a contract for E.ON to perform the main geotechnical investigation for the proposed Arkona-Becken Südost offshore windfarm in the Baltic Sea, off the coast of Schleswig-Holstein 40km north east of Rügen.

On the stand, Fugro also features the successful installation of three sets of foundations for Aquamarine Power's full scale pre-commercial Oyster devices at the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC).