Floating wind farms to power oil and gas

’Green Volt’ is a project by a joint venture between Scottish offshore wind company Flotation Energy and Norway-based Vårgrønn, itself a joint venture between the Italian energy company Plenitude and the Norwegian energy investor HitecVision.

It will consist of up to 35 floating turbines 80km off the coast of Peterhead in Scotland, and is scheduled to be fully operational by 2029.

The site, which has a projected generation capacity of 560MW, is in the Outer Moray Firth, an inlet in the north of Scotland.

This is the second oil and gas power project by Vårgrønn and Flotation Energy that has contracted Rovco to conduct the survey work, also using Glomar Supporter.

In August 2023 a deal was signed for works to be carried out at the Cenos floating wind farm 200km off the northeast coast of Scotland, in the Central North Sea.

UK-based survey technology firm Rovco has been hired to carry out the surveys for both sites, with the Green Volt one destined to be one of the largest floating wind sites in the world.

For Green Volt, Rovco will focus on geophysical surveys in the array area, offshore and nearshore export cable corridors, shallow Piezocone Penetration Test and vibrocoring. Rovco’s DP2 survey vessel Glomar Supporter, on long-term charter from Glomar, will begin geophysical operations from Aberdeen imminently.

“The geophysical surveys carried out will be key in informing the anchor design for the floating turbines, streamlining Green Volt’s development to become one of the world’s largest offshore floating wind farms,” Rovco says.