SELKIE tools – Logistics and Operation and Maintenance (O&M) decision-support tool

The SELKIE Project is developing models that seek to aid site selection, logistics optimisation and financial analysis of wave or tidal farms.

As part of work package 8, UCC is developing a Logistics and Operation and Maintenance (O&M) decision-support tool, which will allow users to simulate operations considering uncertain factors e.g. weather and failures and their impact on the costs and power production of a project. It will allow users to optimise the logistics required for the installation and O&M phase e.g. the selection of ports, offshore vessel fleet, operational strategy etc.  Building on learning from existing models, it will provide stakeholders an open access, user-friendly, and flexible tool that can be applied to a wide range of wave and tidal technologies. Outputs can be used as inputs into the GIS TE tool to determine the overall financial viability of the project scenario.

The logistic tool will be developed for Windows systems and standalone PCs. Functionality of the tool includes: 

• Simulating the installation of the substructure (fixed or floating) and device.
• Simulating the onshore and/or offshore preventive and corrective maintenance of the device.
• Calculating the annual and total costs for installation and O&M considering vessels, technicians, bases used, spare parts and consumables.
• Determining device downtime and energy production, resulting in the average time and energy-based availability of the project.

The model is in development with initial internal testing commencing on the Logistics and O&M tool in June 2021. It is anticipated that the tool will be released in Spring 2022 accompanied by clear and easy-to-follow documentation, instructions and a workshop for user training.