ABB Takes on Tough Challenges Posed by Offshore Wind

Offshore wind presents many thorny challenges, the solutions of which, if they are to exist at all, require our very best engineering minds.

Some of these are related to securing the turbines. Fortunately, there are oceans, like the Atlantic off the East Coast of the U.S., whose waters are shallow enough to permit us to anchor turbines into the sea bed. You can be 15 miles off the coast of New Jersey, and you’ll be in only about 80 feet of water. Other ocean scenarios are the precise opposite; take the Pacific, for instance, off the coast of California, where an equivalent distance from land can find you in water a mile deep. In cases like this, the turbines need to float, requiring, obviously, an entire new set of engineered solutions.

Another challenge, of course, is building a safe and reliable way to bring all that energy onshore. To that end, I’m proud to announce that ABB (a client of mine in the 1990s) has made a fabulous leap forward in cabling—one that immediately doubles the amount of power that can be transmitted. The company’s chief technology officer is understandably proud. “It’s on the list of ABB’s most important breakthroughs in the last five years,” he says.