Gavin & Doherty Geosolutions (GDG) has introduced its newly-developed design procedure for monopiles – Optiwind Monopile – which allows offshore monopiles to be optimised in a way that leads to significant steel weight savings.
The Optiwind design procedure requires careful calibration to match the site specific conditions, however, the considerable cost savings in construction greatly prevail over the additional engineering time, according to the company.
Paul Doherty , Managing Director at GDG, said: “Design savings greater than 20% have been just realized on projects in both the North Sea and Baltic study. The saving in steel weight comes from optimized design penetrations and efficient engineering of the monopile wall thickness. GDG’s Optiwind procedure is now being applied to industry to realize significant savings in steel tonnage”.
The company said the launch of the new solution comes after more than 5 years of internal research and development, during which GDG engineers have been involved in industry research projects such as PISA and LEANWIND , and developed significant expertise in the behaviour of offshore monopiles.