OFFSHORE CHARGING The Oasis Power Buoy has now achieved a series of important testing milestones into a charger at the service station and driving around the car park at 80km/h while somebody’s throwing buckets of seawater at you.” In partnership with Blackfish Engineering and Tidal Transit, and as part of the Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition (CMDC) run by the UK’s Department for Transport and Innovate UK, MJR has developed and built a prototype in-air, gravity-fed ‘funnel’ CTV charging system that can be mounted on a turbine or an offshore substation (OSS). Onshore harbor trials at the Port of Blyth in 2023 were successful, using Tidal Transit’s CTV, Tia Elizabeth. “Offshore tests will follow in Q1 2024, with plans to upscale the system with higher power to cope with larger service operation vessels (SOVs),” says Cairns. Oasis Marine has been developing its Oasis Power Buoy (OPB) offshore charging system for more than three years. It recently successfully transferred power to a CTV during CMDC-initiated tests at the Port of Peterhead, along with support from 23 Degrees Renewables, GulfXStream and JifMar Scotland. Mooring tests were also staged, in which the CTV was successfully moored to the OPB. “This was the first in a series of tests, and one of the things we were able to prove was the fundamental operation of the buoy and the pull across of the power head onto the vessel,” says George Smith, Oasis Marine’s managing director. “Like development of any new technology, it is a challenge to develop, deploy and demonstrate safe and reliable operation of these systems for the first time,” says Lauren Hadnum, clean maritime manager at the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult, a technology innovation and research center in the UK. “This is why projects by companies such as MJR and Oasis Marine, carried out under CMDC and ZEVI (Zero Emission Vessels and Infrastructure) funding, are critical. They demonstrate technology performance to industry to enable valuable learning, prior to deployment, and accelerate uptake and acceptance of these systems.” Technology barriers include the physical charging connectors. “None of the off-the-shelf connectors are really suitable,” explains Smith. Subsea connectors are available but are designed to work at depths of 100m of seawater and mating five or six times. “We’re looking for something that will operate at the surface, in the splash zone, sometimes in salt water, sometimes in air, and can meet at least 5,000 times,” he says. Oasis Marine is working with the Carbon Trust on a standardized connector, which is another huge topic. “There is now a general agreement around the interface to CTVs,” Smith says, adding that for any individual wind farm there could be several CTVs operating during a year, so a standardized connector is important. Automation is another key enabler, to make charging safer for vessel crews. “We Vard is planning full-scale prototype testing in the North Sea in 2024 Standardized connectors 48 // January 2024 // ElectricHybridMarineTechnology.com