Insight Joins BWEA

Reflecting our commitment to the renewables sector Insight Marine Projects are pleased to announce full corporate membership of the BWEA.

As the British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) their primary role is to promote the use of wind, wave and tidal power in and around the UK. They act as a central point for information for our members and as a lobbying group to promote wind energy and marine renewables to government, industry, the media and the public. They also research and find solutions to current issues and generally act as the forum for the UK wind, wave and tidal industry.

Membership will play an important role in bringing together key players around the vital issues affecting industry through working groups and events. Members range from small companies to the largest international corporations, providing us with fantastic networking opportunities.

From March 2010 the BWEA will be rebranded as RenewableUK, this is to reflect the wider obligations the group now has to other forms of renewable power, notably wave & tide.

www.bwea.com

Spreading Christmas Warmth

A large box full of woolly hats, scarves, gloves, thermal socks and long johns was delivered by Insight Marine Projects Ltd to Fowey Mission to Seafarers for them to distribute to marine crew visiting Fowey in the coming months.

Many seafarers arrive from warmer climes and are unprepared for the cold, damp and windy conditions they face at this time of year. Alex Richards from Insight Marine Projects said 'instead of sending Christmas cards to our customers we decided to do something more practical to assist seafarers spending time away from their homes this Christmas'.

More information can be found at www.missiontoseafarers.org

BWEA-31 Liverpool

Yesterday we took a visit to the BWEA-31 exhibition and conference at the ACC in Liverpool. The event gave us an opportunity to see where the renewables industry is heading and to gauge any effect the economic downturn is having on the progress of various projects.

Although predominantly orientated towards the wind sector many of the companies relevant to our work are also involved in the development of wave/tidal technology.

We will be looking forward to attending the 2010 BWEA Wave & Tidal Conference on the 4th March.

www.insight-marine.co.uk

Panama Job Complete

Insight Marine's contract with Underwater Technical Services to supply surface positioning equipment and personnel for the shore-end repair work on the PAC-7 communications cable has now been completed successfully.

As usual the ability of the local workforce to delay the project in ever more inventive ways led to hold-ups for the overall project, however, with a favorable weather window we were able to complete the work on schedule within five days.

Ongoing work on the beach includes installation of cable protection with split-pipe and restoring the area to it's former state.


View footage of the Panama project here.
www.insight-marine.co.uk

Panama Mobilisation

Mobilising here in Panama for the PAC7 cable repair job we've ended up in an abandoned US fort built to defend the Atlantic side of the Panama canal. Built in 1912 Fort Sherman is a strange place, complete with bunkers and gun emplacements slowly being reclaimed by the jungle. This is where the US and allies trained their troops for jungle warfare. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Sherman)

The weirdness continued when we found out that the Shelter Bay Marina was used for location shooting on the latest James Bond film, Quantum of Solace.

That's Daniel Craig standing near the black RIB by the way.

As far as a mobilisation goes the Marina is an ideal spot to moor the barge with accommodation close by, hopefully with less gun fire though.

www.insight-marine.co.uk

Typhoon Hits Philippines

The input of the weather in any marine job is often what will make or break a project, ensuring we have the most up to date and accurate information has been critical whilst working in the Philippines.

It still amazes me that from the other side of the world we can predict the weather for a particular area with very high confidence. This was shown recently when Typhoon Chan-Hom passed over the work site, the vessel and equipment were moved to safety in good time but having this data available on demand almost entirely removes the weather risk for jobs where swell conditions are critical to the job.

Weather data for this job has been provided by Nowcasting Wilkins Weather Technologies.
www.insight-marine.co.uk

Working in the Philippines

Our recent cable burial support contract on behalf of Alcatel Lucent in the Philippines has opened my eyes on a range of things from logistics on the other side of the world.

The Philippines is a friendly place and the locals are more than happy to help or assist, especially if they know there's money involved somewhere along the line. That doesn't make it any easier to get things done when there's a deadline though!

Working from the beach and based in a hotel called the Bali Hai then things can't be that bad! With a crew transfer off the beach it beats long transits on supply ships or choppers and with the work site a stone's throw from the hotel it's almost civilized!

With the challenges of operating a project at such a distance from the UK it is refreshing to see that the distance and cultral differences are not a barrier to the successful execution of such projects.
www.insight-marine.co.uk