FloatWind Ltd, a technology and mass-assembly company focused on the rapid development and delivery of ready-to-float wind turbines using lean production techniques for the offshore renewable energy industry, will rename as Vidi Energy, as part of a review of its strategy for 2022.
The company, which secured a successful seed funding round ending in October 2021, will continue developing its technology and go to market strategy with a view to raising further funds in late 2022 to support the development of its assembly facility.
As more countries explore offshore wind energy as an option, floating solutions, which can be deployed in more circumstances than the established fixed-bottom approach, will be increasingly in demand on a commercial scale. However, the high cost of floating wind, projected at upwards of USD150/MWh, is a serious barrier to achieving this. The current batch production methods, designed to support the project-by-project roll out of fixed-bottom wind farms, are a major obstacle to reducing the cost of floating wind technology, as they increase the costs of construction and installation.
Under the new Vidi Energy name, the company will develop technology to standardize and accelerate the process of bringing floating foundations and wind turbines together for installation offshore. In this way, Vidi Energy aims to eliminate variations between projects, which limit economies of scale and require developers to extend construction schedules and budgets unnecessarily to accommodate bespoke engineering and installation work.
Nele Andersch, Co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer at Vidi Energy said, “during our seed funding round we recognized, with our investors, that this approach to reducing costs in floating wind energy will be applicable across other floating infrastructure as the energy transition moves forwards.
“The name change reflects our core belief that to deliver the transition, floating wind must look beyond current approaches to assembly and adopt standardization and automation techniques that have lowered costs in other industries. The new name also emphasizes how the business will continue to look forwards and see where we can support the construction process of floating infrastructure in wind and other sectors of the marine energy transition to drive costs down.”
In 2022, Vidi Energy will continue to progress discussions with technology and investment partners as it seeks to develop a production process that will use assembly facilities at harborside to deploy ready-to-float wind turbines, making installing wind farms safer and faster, at a lower cost of energy.
Commenting on the value of mass assembly of floating energy systems to fuel this transition, Chief Technology Officer and Co-founder Robert Speht said, “moving away from batch production will unlock huge savings in the assembly and construction processes, significantly reduce schedules for all kinds of offshore power projects, and drive carbon savings in the sector. Using mass production methods, Vidi Energy aims to accelerate the transition away from fossil fuel energy sources and reduce the cost of energy.”
