AWAIT: Integration of different data sources for the real-time adjustment of offshore project plans and optimization of resource allocation - Automated Weather risk Analysis and Impact Tracking

At a glance

• In the next ten years, the digital transformation will be decisive for efficiency, cost reduction, and risk minimization throughout the entire life cycle of wind energy projects, especially in the offshore sector.
• The aim of the AWAIT microproject is to develop software integrating different data sources to analyze project progress in real time, make adjustments, and simulate future developments.
• By comparing the planned and actual project statuses, the software will make it possible to take informed decisions, optimize the use of resources, and respond to deviations early, thereby lowering costs and reducing risks.

The challenge

From wind turbine manufacturing to construction and operation right up to decommissioning, the digital transformation has had an impact on the entire value chain in the field of wind energy. In the next ten years, the progress of the digital transformation is set to be one of the decisive factors for improving performance, reducing costs, and minimizing risks throughout the life cycle of a wind project.

The prerequisite for realizing this potential is high-performance software putting stakeholders in the wind energy sector - and in the offshore segment especially - in a position to identify, what impact weather conditions, logistical complexities, and problems in asset and resource management are having on their wind project. A corresponding concept has already been developed at Fraunhofer IWES but has yet to be validated.

The solution

This is where the AWAIT microproject comes in. The aim is to develop software integrating different data sources for real-time adjustment of offshore project plans and optimization of resource allocation. AWAIT is investigating the extent to which daily progress reports can be automatically evaluated. Its findings will be combined with the results of the LogReview and COAST 2.0 projects to validate the viability of the software application described above.

The data basis will be compiled from daily progress reports and wind farm project plans, data from the automatic identification system (AIS) in common use in shipping, and weather data time series (WDTS), among other sources. The project information supplies the planned status and the daily progress reports reveal the actual status of a project. This actual status can be used to simulate the future development of the project with current and historical WDTS data, thus showing, for example, the impact of delays in the construction of a wind farm. Stakeholders can then respond to deviations quickly.

The added value

AWAIT represents a combined approach for the optimization, digitalization, and logging of construction and maintenance projects in the offshore segment. Stakeholders from the offshore wind energy sector can utilize the comparisons of the planned and actual project statuses to make informed decisions, reduce costs, minimize risks, and conserve resources.