Singapore's Sembcorp Marine said Wednesday it had won a contract for the construction of a Wind Turbine Installation Vessel (“WTIV”).
The company did not say who the client was. It said that the WTIV design was based on Sembcorp Marine’s in-house design in collaboration with the customer. Sembcorp Marine did not share information on the value of the order.
"The WTIV project is scheduled to be completed in early 2025. Sembcorp Marine collaborated with its customer intensively over two years providing design development and verification work," the company said.
Sembcorp Marine said the WTIV would be capable of handling the next generation of wind turbines, without providing further details on the vessel specs.
Sembcorp Marine Rigs & Floaters Senior Vice President, Wong Teck Cheong said, “We are grateful for the confidence our customer has placed with Sembcorp Marine to bring this breakthrough WTIV design to the offshore wind market. The Group looks forward to continuing the close collaboration with our customer to execute this project and contribute to the pace of energy transition.”
"With this contract win, Sembcorp Marine strengthens its position in the renewable energy segment, validating its strategy to transform itself into an innovative engineering solutions provider in the offshore, marine, and energy industries with a strategic focus on sustainability," Sembcorp Marine said.
Rystad Energy recently said that the growing offshore wind ambitions across the globe along with ever-growing turbines, could soon pose a problem as there doesn't seem to be enough vessels to meet the growing demand for the installation of these giant offshore wind turbines.
According to Rystad Energy, the demand will outpace the supply of capable vessels very soon, by 2024.
"As the energy transition accelerates, demand for offshore wind turbine installation vessels worldwide, excluding China, will rocket from 11 vessel years in 2021 to almost 79 vessel years by 2030. The need for installation vessels for turbines larger than 9 MW, which was nonexistent in 2019, will grow significantly by the end of the decade and reach 62 vessel years in 2030," Rystad said.
With the demand growing, there has been an increase in orders for newbuild offshore installation vessels, as well as for new, larger cranes to be installed on the existing fleet.