SeaWynd: Autonomous Inspection of Seabed and Splash Zone Structures for Offshore Wind Arrays

Offshore wind turbines can become corroded by wave effects in the so called splash zone near the water surface. Visualising this damage is difficult due to the extreme environment. Currently, scheduling maintenance is based on rough approximations of structure lifetime rather than requirements, which is expensive.

SeaWynd aims to provide a sensor payload to remotely survey this splash zone and provide high resolution datasets from which to detect any abnormal changes to the turbine structure. This would reduce operation and maintenance costs for managing offshore wind farms

This project will involve both the development and hardening of the SeaWynd device with an evaluation of its performance during a sea-trial at an operational marine renewable energy site.