Dr Gregory Bush¹

¹Rps, Perth, Australia

The Netherland Enterprise Agency (RVO) conduct a Metocean survey at prospective offshore wind farm locations in the North Sea and shares the data publicly for all prospective developers to use. Reflecting the importance of the accuracy and reliability of the data gathered, particularly measurement of the wind energy, RVO uses ‘best practice’ survey design.  Pre-deployment calibration or validations are specified. The contractor is required to deploy two metocean Buoys only 1 km apart, essentially measuring at the same location. The redundant buoys assist to secure continuous data coverage for the 2-year program, with a third spare buoy maintained ready to deploy as further back-up.  Data and reporting are delivered monthly covering wind profile, waves, met, currents and water levels. Monthly quantitative comparison of data from the two buoys assists in data quality control and verification of accuracy.  Identifying the potential for identical buoys to produce identical errors, for example due to a software bug, the survey contractor must also validate each data parameter against a near-by independent data source in monthly reporting.  RPS are conducting two such surveys for RVO and validation results have been excellent, with examples presented here.

Biography:

Greg Bush has a 30 years experience in commercial oceanography, particularly Metocean survey in the project manager and project director roles. His experience is global in extent. He is currently the general manager for RPS Metocean.