There are steady winds blowing off the shores of the United Kingdom, and businesses in Atlantic Canada are exploring what those gusts could do for their bottom line.
The Newfoundland and Labrador Environmental Industry Association (NEIA) recently took the lead on an ongoing virtual development mission to connect Atlantic Canadian companies with opportunities in the U.K. offshore wind energy sector. A small number of companies were recruited and given a crash course on projects happening in the country, taking in presentations from research institutions and relevant industry organizations. From there, NEIA has helped set up business-to-business meetings.
"International business is all about relationships and long-term relationships," NEIA CEO Kieran Hanley told The Telegram. "Although we can't sit and have a cup of coffee or a pint today with potential business partners, we do get introduced to folks, and hopefully in a year’s time, we can get on a plane and go talk about what our companies have to offer ... We've had success in the past with this, and we anticipate we will have success again."
Hanley said the U.K. government is eager to ramp up offshore wind energy development — he referred to Europe as a global mecca for wind energy opportunities.
"They have set some very aggressive targets for the growth of that industry in the years to come," Hanley said.
Every U.K. home
Earlier this fall, Prime Minister Boris Johnson told media every home in the U.K. will be powered by offshore wind energy by the end of the decade.
"A decade sounds like a long time, but it's actually a short time frame for these types of things to happen," Hanley said. "That means the supply chain is going to need to expand quite quickly and we see that there's going to be opportunities for companies from around the world to become a part of those developments.
"Although we can't sit and have a cup of coffee or a pint today with potential business partners, we do get introduced to folks, and hopefully in a year’s time, we can get on a plane and go talk about what our companies have to offer." — Kieran Hanley
"We think Atlantic Canadian companies are positioned very well in that regard. That's because since we've been here as a people, the ocean has provided the means for our livelihoods, whether it be through fisheries, offshore winds, aquaculture — you name it. The experience and expertise we've developed over here is very, very applicable to the offshore wind industry."
One Atlantic Canadian company with its foot already in the door is PanGeo Subsea. The company, specializing in subsea imaging for geohazards, established an office in Aberdeen, Scotland, a few years ago. While most of its 70-plus employees are based in St. John's, the company also has staff in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and Boston.
PanGeo does most of its business in Europe.
"The oil and gas sector, that in itself globally is cyclical, and we were fortunate that in 2014, when we saw the market starting to pick up in the offshore renewable energy sector in Europe, we saw synergies with regards to the types of applications we had ... and jumped right on board that sector and started to market towards it," explained Moya Cahill, PanGeo's co-founder and CEO.
Relationship building
In 2014, the company only had about a dozen employees. Since then, PanGeo has built relationships with a number of young companies in the renewable energy sector, including Ørsted. The Danish company has offshore wind farms in Europe, North America and Asia. PanGeo has worked extensively with Ørsted to identify geohazards. Most recently, the company has helped spot unexploded ordnances from the First and Second World Wars in the U.K.
"We'll go out before they're doing their installation and take a snapshot of the subsea bed, and we'll let them know if it's clear to drive their (monopile foundation) or not," Cahill said, adding they can provide this information in real-time to partners and help them mitigate risk and move quickly to find an alternate location.
Cahill acknowledges there are plenty of business opportunities for Atlantic Canadian companies in the U.K. offshore wind energy sector. She said the logistical challenges to tackle working in the offshore oil and gas sector have a lot in common with offshore wind energy. Opportunities are also abounding south of the border along the Northeastern Seaboard, and Cahill believes East Coast companies are geographically well-positioned to serve that market.
"Offshore wind is such a rapidly expanding global industry," Cahill said. "The world is looking at a net-zero carbon footprint in the future. In Europe, they're looking at making that happen by 2030 ... Certainly, every Western country is equally looking at their carbon footprint and their contribution to sustainability."
Andrew Robinson is a business reporter in St. John's.
