The 15 meter Sea Puffin Daughter Craft offers the same wave height performance as a 20 meter crew transfer vessel, with less than half the fuel oil consumption.
The vessel’s great performances are made possible by the ship type: Surface Effect Ship (SES), also known as air cushioned catamaran or side hulled hovercraft. She has two side hulls like a catamaran, but has flexible rubber sealing fore and aft between the hulls. Fans blow air into this air cushion between the hulls and rubber seals, and partly lifts the vessel up and out of the water.
The vessels can be adapted to specific operator requirements.
For the first build, Sea Puffin 1, detailed information can be found in vessel review in the Workboat World magazine. The Sea Puffin 1 was by same magazine awarded The best Offshore Support Vessel - Wind Farm Service Vessel for 2018.
Surface Effect Ship Daughter Craft
Surface Effect Ship Crew Transfer Vessel
BV | ✠ HULL ● MACH, Light Ship - Fast passenger vessel, Sea area 2
Aluminium alloy
15-16 m (<15m rule length)
5.6 m
1.4 m (off cushion), 0.5 m (on cushion)
2 ton
Up to 15 m2
9-12
Water jets
2 x 260 kW
20-25 knots
150 l/hour at 100% engine power
Up to 1.8 m significant wave height (Hs)
1.5 m Hs for generally all conditions
As single hook Daughter Craft or Crew Transfer Vessel (CTV)
As CTV the payload can be increased
Can be supplied complete with davit system
Lease, with or without crew, and purchase options
Custom painting and interior
This provides reduced contact with the water, and therefore allows for low fuel oil consumption. The air cushion pressure is controlled by valves. These are also used for motion damping and especially while accessing offshore structures. Using this motion damping, the Sea Puffin can access offshore wind turbines in wave heights as if she had been a significantly larger vessel. The first of class, Sea Puffin 1, has proven safe turbine access in up to 1.75m significant wave height.
The Sea Puffin is available as single-hook Daughter Craft or near-shore cost-effective Crew Transfer Vessel.
The idea of the Sea Puffin was conceived by ESNA on a roadtrip to Denmark in 2015
Challenged by a potential client, the idea was to apply SES technology to a daughter craft application. The SES daughter craft should operate from a mothership inside a wind farm in much larger wave heights than currently available daughter crafts. The mothership could use a walk-to-work system and move slowly between the wind turbines, while the Sea Puffin would efficiently distribute the technicians to the other wind turbines.
Initially supported by Innovation Norway, the Regional Research Council Agder and Sørlandet Knowledge Foundation, ESNA joined forces with service provider WindPartner in 2016 and started to detail the design. The Carbon Trust’s Offshore Wind Accelerator also supported the development from 2016. ENOVA further supported the project into realization as WindPartner in 2017 ordered the first vessel built at Esbjerg Shipyard in Denmark. The Summer 2018 the first vessel, Sea Puffin 1, entered into successful trials at Vattenfall’s Horns Rev 1 and Ørsted’s Horns Rev 2 wind farms.
The Sea Puffin 1 has successfully demonstrated all expected performances, including turbine access in 1.75m Hs and average fuel consumption of less than 100 l/hr for a daily operation.
The SES daughter craft should operate from a mothership inside a wind farm in.
The SES daughter craft should operate from a mothership inside a wind farm in.
The SES daughter craft should operate from a mothership inside a wind farm in.