NOW Accelerator winners take control of drifting wind turbines
Blackfish Engineering and StormLinker are the winners of the first NOW Accelerator Challenge by Nordvegen Vind. The two finalists created the best solutions on how to regain control of a floating offshore wind turbine that has come loose from its anchors.
06. juni 2024
The NOW Accelerator is about challenging the status quo and creating groundbreaking solutions that can shape the future of the floating wind sector. The prevailing candidates won following final pitches for their solutions at the Norwegian Offshore Wind (NOW) conference Floating Wind Days in Haugesund.
– We received a large number of solutions for our challenge. The two winners show great potential for deployment in floating wind, as well as other industries. The solutions are diverse and show great ingenuity by their developers, says Roberts Proskovics, Senior Floating Wind Specialist, Corio Generation.
The second NOW Accelerator challenge from Nordvegen Vind was also revealed.
Read more about the new challenge here.
– One of the key areas of focus for the Nordvegen Vind consortium is to develop the offshore wind industry both in Norway and internationally. Nordvegen Vind supports various initiatives within R&D, start-ups and scale-ups, among which the NOW Accelerator program is a significant instrument. We are excited to follow the two winners going forward, says Jarle Dyrdal, Vice President and Head of Offshore Wind.
The next NOW Accelerator challenge by Nordvegen Vind
The NOW Accelerator journey with Nordvegen Vind began on March 14th when Å Energi and Corio launched the challenge targeting "Floating Offshore Wind-Safe Solutions for Black Swan Events”. This challenge called for sustainability startups to propose solutions that prioritise environmental and human safety, as well as financial stability and operational efficiency in the offshore wind sector.
– Thanks to our industry partners, we can scale and get the best startups globally to be involved. We are immensely proud of the winners from Nordvegen Vind and the two other consortiums who presented their winners at Floating Wind Days in Haugesund, Narve Hansen, Manager of NOW Accelerator, states.
At the Floating Wind Days conference in Haugesund, Nordvegen Vind also announced the second NOW Accelerator Challenge: a focused challenge to develop innovative monitoring technologies for the environmental impacts of floating offshore wind farms, specially targeting methods to precisely measure microplastic pollution, noise pollution, and the effects on biodiversity and submit suggestion for solution.