Function
Provides technical expertise, planning, and advisory services to design, optimise, and outline technical specification for offshore wind farm development.
What it costs*
About £9.5 million for a 1 GW offshore wind farm.
Who supplies them
Suppliers include:
ABL Group, Acteon Group, APEM, Apollo, Arup, BMT, BVG Associates, CASC, Cathie, Chartwell Marine, Correll Group, DORIS, Enshore Subsea, Entrust Professional, Environment Ltd (Atlantic58), ERM, First Marine Solutions, First Subsea, Global Maritime, Heavy Lift Projects, HR Wallingford, JDR Cable Systems, Kent, Kinewell Energy, Maritime Developments, Mott MacDonald, Motive Offshore Group, Ocean Infinity, Oceaneering, OEG Renewables, Offshore Solutions Group, ONYX Insight, Pharos Offshore, RPS, SeaRoc, Seaway 7, SMD, Sulmara, Tekmar Group, Turner & Townsend, Venterra, Verlume, W3G Marine, Western Isles Marine, Wood, Wood Thilsted and Xodus.
Key facts
Front-end engineering and design (FEED) studies address areas of wind farm system design and develop the concept of the wind farm in advance of procurement, contracting and construction.
Earlier on in the process, pre-FEED studies are used to develop an outline concept of the project for the purposes for defining the consent envelope and to inform environmental impact studies.
The FEED study is refined through the development process in to “detailed design” post-FID. Designs are ultimately used to frame and process substantial engineering and procurement decisions.
Key parameters such as turbine size, foundation type, wind farm layout, substation design, electrical system and grid connection method are considered in order to minimise the project’s levelised cost of energy (LCOE).
FEED studies also include planning of onshore and offshore operations, port and vessel strategies, determining contracting methodologies and the development of key risk management and health and safety procedures.
The FEED study seeks to understand the total wind farm system in an integrated way and to consider the impact of engineering decisions on the LCOE, and to ensure that engineering decisions take full cognisance of environmental and consenting risks and impacts.
The FEED study is a multi-disciplinary process that requires extensive communication and coordination, often across multiple teams and organisations.
Engineers normally use industry-specific standards to guide the design process for components including the substructure. The most complete standards for floating offshore wind are IEC 61400-3-1 and DNV-ST-0126.
The output of FEED studies is used by construction management teams in order to procure and construct the wind farm.
The move to auction based systems such as CfD in the UK has placed a greater emphasis on FEED studies as developers require greater cost certainty earlier in the development process.
Project certification is an independent process used to give confidence to parties such as the developer’s senior management, lenders or insurers, that the design, manufacture and installation of the whole project has been carried out to appropriate standards. It is not a regulatory requirement in the UK but is normally used for offshore wind projects.
What’s in it
- Layout design and optimisation
- Turbine selection
- Foundation type selection
- Electrical design strategy
- Interface management
- Health and safety planning
- Installation methods
- Operational strategy