Editorial
Welcome to the September / October edition of Offshore Engineer and our focus on Digitalization. “Digitalization” has, in many respects, become one of this overused industry buzzwords, jargon that means 100 different things to 100 different people. With that we set our editor in Australia, Wendy Laursen, on the path of discovery, to dig deeper into the companies that are ‘walking the walk’ in terms of leveraging digital solutions. And she found a treasure trove. In July, ADNOC and e& announced a project to build a 5G network that will relay information from sensors embedded in more than 12,000 wells and pipelines to autonomous control rooms. It is due to be completed in 2025 and expected to generate $1.5 billion in value during its first five years of operation. Siemens Energy is working on new concepts to make subsea digital systems smarter using its Subsea DigiGRID control, safety and digital twin systems. These are just two of multiple real-world case studies driving the digital trend in offshore energy today.
In this edition we’re pleased to welcome back a long-tenured colleague Joe Keefe. Joe was editor of sister-publication Marine News for many years, and we were able to cajole him back with a trek to Sweden in August for an up close and personal ride onboard Northern Offshore Services (N-O-S) unique I-Class Crew Transfer Vessel (CTV), powered by the first commercial application of Volvo Penta’s IPS Professional Platform. As Joe writes, “in the cutting-edge IMPRESSER, N-O-S designed a flexible, future-proof CTV that will adapt to and accommodate new technologies and energy solutions over the next 25 years, all of which is targeted to exceed the needs of their most important cargo: the offshore engineers that they serve.” While much is written about the plethora of new and emerging technologies that power the offshore energy business ahead, perhaps more should be dedicated to the technologies that are designed to enhance and protect the lives and well-being of the people that continue to work in and around some of the most challenging industrial conditions on the planet.
Last but certainly not least, read up on the new Menck hammer, a 6250KJ pile driving system that can only be best described by a German engineer offering the following illustrative analogy, saying that the new hammer – when it enters ethe market in 2027 – delivers a blow “which is the equivalent of a Porsche hitting a wall at 190 mph!”
“We are approaching the limit that mankind can build right now,” said Fabian Hippe, Marine Foundations Sales Director, Acteon, “as with the 6000 we have maximized the weight of the ram that we can build.”
Though the Menck hammers were originally designed for [and still used in] the offshore oil and gas market, the MHU 6000W is designed to meet the growing demands of the offshore renewable sector, opening up new possibilities for offshore wind projects by handling larger and heavier piles in increasingly challenging environments.
