Mainstream study over 100 million routes, with Optioneer™
Mainstream Renewable Power is currently developing three offshore wind farms off the east, southeast and west coasts of Ireland. These projects support the Irish government’s 2030 targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
100 million
Route and grid connection scenarios studied.
2000km
Combined length of connection cables.
150+
connection permutations taken into account.
With a strict Irish planning regime, competition from multiple renewables developers in the same region and the challenge of managing multiple complex offshore wind developments, Mainstream needed to deliver on a thorough route assessment process whilst avoiding major project delays and overruns.
Mainstream’s three offshore sites are located in a highly-competitive area of the Irish Sea due to its strong and consistent wind resources. This has attracted offshore wind developers from all over the world, placing extra pressure on companies to demonstrate due consideration of all possible routing scenarios, both onshore and offshore, to appease the Irish planning regime.
The complexity of connecting offshore windfarms to the grid means studying multiple geographical areas, assessing potential locations for offshore substation platforms, identifying landfalls and finding feasible grid connection points. Hundreds of potential combinations need to be assessed in order to undertake a thorough assessment that planning inspectors demand.
However the process can prove manual and time consuming, with any changes in data or assumptions adding delays and costs to projects. Strict deadlines can prove demanding for companies that need to submit applications which have a good chance of being approved.
The process
Mainstream had a significant amount of route and grid connection exploration to accomplish prior to a tight deadline. The team employed Optioneer to automate much of this work.
With the help of Optioneer, Mainstream was able to explore millions of options with a simultaneous assessment of environmental, social, engineering and cost criteria.
The platform returned a broader range of options with more detailed analysis on dozens of criteria, to ensure a thorough assessment was undertaken, including onshore and offshore routes.
Optioneer’s collaborative features enabled the entire team to review route data, input into decision making, and refine preferred options in real time, all on the same platform. This helped the team accelerate the optioneering process whilst providing a reliable single source of truth for the project.
This gave Mainstream more confidence in being able to accelerate their offshore wind projects and submit stronger applications to Irish infrastructure planning bodies.
Mainstream had a significant amount of route and grid connection exploration to accomplish prior to a tight deadline. The team employed Optioneer to automate much of this work.
With the help of Optioneer, Mainstream was able to explore millions of options with a simultaneous assessment of environmental, social, engineering and cost criteria.
The platform returned a broader range of options with more detailed analysis on dozens of criteria, to ensure a thorough assessment was undertaken, including onshore and offshore routes.
Optioneer’s collaborative features enabled the entire team to review route data, input into decision making, and refine preferred options in real time, all on the same platform. This helped the team accelerate the optioneering process whilst providing a reliable single source of truth for the project.
This gave Mainstream more confidence in being able to accelerate their offshore wind projects and submit stronger applications to Irish infrastructure planning bodies.
The results
Mainstream was able to significantly expand the number of potential route options and grid connection points they could study within the timeframe needed, with over 100 million assessed. The company achieved this whilst accelerating its consenting programmes and without compromising on the quality of assessment.
Optioneer delivered an intelligent solution for Mainstream to automate and significantly expand its route optioneering programme, with a collaborative platform that enabled different departments to work together in one digital workplace. The project team were able to decide on a final route shortlist and refine their preferred options, all within Optioneer.
Mainstream was able to significantly expand the number of potential route options and grid connection points they could study within the timeframe needed, with over 100 million assessed. The company achieved this whilst accelerating its consenting programmes and without compromising on the quality of assessment.
Optioneer delivered an intelligent solution for Mainstream to automate and significantly expand its route optioneering programme, with a collaborative platform that enabled different departments to work together in one digital workplace. The project team were able to decide on a final route shortlist and refine their preferred options, all within Optioneer.
Simultaneous evaluation of three potential development windows across all of Ireland, with limited overhead
Confidence from assessment of 100 million alternative solutions.
All subject matter expertise incorporated in analysis.
“We used Optioneer’s AI to efficiently seek the most feasible offshore and onshore cable routes, narrowing down millions of options to a shortlist. We then utilised the platform to further refine these routes, simply and efficiently collaborating across the project team, involving engineering, consenting and stakeholder management along with external consultants – all providing inputs within Optioneer to select the most feasible routes”
Have you got a similar project to deliver?
Reach out today and see how Optioneer can help streamline your project planning and development.
Related success stories
We’ve had the pleasure of working with global leaders in the utilities industry, find out how they achieved results with Optioneer.
We will be in touch with you shortly.