• Renewable energy

Racing ahead with Galloper

James Fisher has secured a huge marine services contract to support the construction phase of the Galloper offshore wind farm off the coast of East Anglia.

When RWE, which has a 25% joint equity partnership stake in Galloper Wind Farm Ltd, was looking for companies to support the building of a huge new wind farm off the coast of East Anglia, it made a significant decision to pick one contractor to fulfil the majority of the project's offshore service elements, rather than splitting them into multiple sub-contracts, as has been typical in the offshore renewables industry.

Marine, offshore and subsea specialist companies within the James Fisher group were brought together to offer an integrated solution which was able to demonstrate operational efficiencies and reduced project costs. The tender process was lengthy, taking almost two years, but through significant team effort, James Fisher was able to demonstrate its capability as one of a very few UK based marine companies which can take on such a broad and extensive range of work.

The contract in excess of £25 million was signed in February 2016 and James Fisher expects to be involved with the Galloper project for around two years.

A significant proportion of the large work scope will be delivered in-house, with group companies offering a range of services both onshore and offshore including marine services, setting up an onshore construction support base and vessel and personnel supply.

"Now the real work starts."

Explains managing director, Martin Sisley, who will be heading up the delivery of the contract.

"The next key task will be to set-up an onshore principal contractor's coordination base to accommodate up to 120 staff."

With the contract only signed on 25 February, the James Fisher team has already started work on offshore communications surveys ahead of installing UHV, VHF satellite and wireless communication systems for the project, as well as early planning works for the onshore base. The new base will be set-up to include temperature-controlled warehousing as well as mooring and fuelling facilities for 16 crew transfer vessels. The James Fisher team will also be providing a host of other onshore services such as communications, waste facilities, canteens, general amenities, refreshment stations such as showers and maintenance facilities to support the project.

'We will be putting navigation buoys out at sea around the perimeter of the site to enable ships to successfully navigate around it and we may be asked to supply UXO services to identify, remove and dispose of any unexploded ordnance we might find,'

says Martin.

This win is a major milestone for James Fisher and puts the group at the forefront of the offshore renewables market in the UK and Europe. RWE's search for a single offshore services contractor for Galloper fed directly into James Fisher's wider strategy to offer and deliver integrated solutions for complex marine projects - just like this.

Read more information on the offshore construction support contract for Galloper:

• Galloper Wind Farm Ltd awards James Fisher offshore services contract for 336MW wind farm