Comprehensive Offshore Analysis and Simulation Tool

Short description

COAST, for Comprehensive Offshore Analysis and Simulation Tool, is an application to support project planning and execution of offshore wind farm installation projects. The main goal of the tool is to deliver a prediction of project durations by considering historical weather and sea state conditions.

COAST addresses two specific aims:
• During the planning phase, allow the simulation of the installation plan for given historical weather data and environmental constraints.
• During planning and actual installation, statistical analysis can be obtained in order to estimate the accuracy of the foreseen project plan.

Main technical features

Simulation of offshore activities, based on
- Project plans
- Operational limits
- Long weather, sea state and other time series
Simulation modes
- Continuous simulation
- Yearly simulation
Evaluation/forecast of the project durations
Export of all results as MS Excel file
Easy import and export of data
Interface to common project management software

Innovative aspects

Development of the WaTTS – Weather Times Series Scheduling – method
Evaluation of long time series
Interfaces to common project management software
Easy integration into the daily work flow
Assessment of the weather risk

Applications

Simulation, analysis, evaluation, comparison of concepts for Transport & Installation (T&I) and the Operation & Maintenance (O&M) phase
Decision support tool
Answers for various questions, e.g.
- Weather risk of T&I projects,
- Evaluation and forecast of the project duration,
- Review and comparison of different logistic strategies
- Analysis of accessibility and planned maintenance concepts
- Development and optimization of O&M concepts
For the entire supply chain:
- Developer and owner
- Installation companies for various components
- Logistic services providers
- Banks and insurance companies
Sectors:
- Transport and Installation (onshore/offshore)
- Operation and Maintenance
- General civil engineering projects