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Geo and NCT launch wind farm drillship

By: Tom Russell 03/03/2017 Geo

General Vessels Windfarms

Engineering consultancy Geo and NCT Offshore have launched a new vessel as part of a new strategic collaboration. The Freja is a S-Class ROV Support DP2 vessel and has been equipped with a drilling set-up designed to provide heave compensated drilling conditions.

Geo explained that the set-up is designed to operate in water depths characteristic of offshore wind projects (approximately 15-60m water), and is optimised for geotechnical and core drilling (GeoBor-S). Geo explained that the drilling methods ensure much higher sample quality than with traditional drill ship solutions, which apply the so called ‘piggy back’ approach.

The company stated that the quality of a geotechnical investigation, including the samples and cores collected from the seabed, is crucial for the following design and optimisation of the foundation for the planned offshore wind farm.

Using the heave compensated setup, the vessel Freja can undertake a range of technical services ranging from geotechnical drilling in soil and rock using the Geobor-S system to a range of CPT (Cone Penetration Tests) and Vibrocore rigs. Additionally, the vessel is equipped for a geophysical spread including side scan sonar, sub bottom profiler, magnetometer and hull mounted multi-beam echo sounder.

Department Director in Geo’s Marine Survey, Jens Brink Clausen, explains: “The system is built up around a specially designed active heave compensated working platform (HCP). The principle of the system is that the entire drilling floor, including drill rig and drillers, is heave compensated to move with the movement of the ship. This means that the working deck is stationary, while the vessel follows the movements of the waves. Being able to work offshore from a stationary deck means that we are able to apply drilling techniques usually limited to onshore drilling. On conventional vessels, only the drill string itself is usually heave compensated.”

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Geo and NCT launch wind farm drillship

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