Ten finalists — five each in two categories — have been selected for the 2022 ONS Innovation Awards that will be held later this month at the biennial ONS industry event in Stavanger, Norway.
The ONS Innovation Award jury received a total of 100 applicants from 13 countries for this year’s awards.
The finalists are now tasked with presenting their innovations on 29 August at the technical sessions venue.
The winner in each category will be announced in the session “The North Sea — the new frontier of energy transition?” at the ONS Conference the following day.
“The finalists are great examples of the green energy transition we are going through — either by cutting emissions in existing industries, improving energy efficiency or delivering new ways and technologies to produce renewable energy,” said the jury leader, Tarjei Nodtvedt Malme of the Norwegian Research Council.
“The breadth represented among this year’s finalists show us that there is no single silver bullet in the energy transition – we need a diverse set of solutions to provide sustainable and affordable energy to society.”
TechnipFMC has been selected as a finalist for its Deep Purple system, which integrates proven technologies such as electrolysers, fuel cells and compressors with the aim of delivering at-scale solutions for offshore green hydrogen production and sustainable renewable energy.
The system consists of offshore wind turbines and offshore hydrogen technologies for the production, storage and transportation of energy in the form of pressurised green hydrogen.
It can also be used to produce, store and deliver hydrogen to consumers at sea or exported in a pipeline to shore, according to TechnipFMC.
Also in competition is Finland’s Wartsila, with its Demo2000 technology. Wartsila, together with partners Knutsen OAS, Repsol and Equinor, has performed practical tests with Demo2000 that document how green fuel can be used in internal combustion engines for power production on today’s ships and at different offshore installations, according to Wartsila.
By 2050, to reach International Maritime Organization emission targets, 80% of the world’s merchant fleet will have to be without carbon dioxide emissions, and by using ammonia it is possible to achieve the goals for decarbonising by using the current propulsion machinery in the ships.
Another finalist in this category is MRC Global, with its ValveWatch technology, whch aims to help mitigate the 5% of global CO2 emissions caused by flaring.
The company has developed the ValveWatch FOV, a continuous online valve condition and performance monitoring system that it estimated contributed to reducing unnecessary flaring by more than 50% during operations.
Another Norwegian company, Aker Solutions, is also in the fray with its ZEUS (zero emissions underwater [power] station) technology, which aims to produce affordable, safe and reliable energy from natural gas without any emissions.
ZEUS produces electrical power by burning natural gas with up to 70% CO2 content and pure oxygen, at the seabed, close to production/injection wells.
The combustion is performed at high pressure in excess of 60 bar utilising the reservoir pressure. The high pressure ensures that when cooled, the exhaust is liquefied directly into water and CO2.
The CO2 and water can then be reinjected using only a pump and the carbon dioxide is permanently stored, never leaving the seabed.
ZEUS will provide electrical power via a cable to shore or to nearby offshore consumers. Zero emissions make ZEUS an environmentally sustainable solution insensitive to CO2 taxes, according to Aker Solutions.
The final contestant in this category is Siemens Energy for its BlueWind technology, which it says will increase and improve the performance of offshore floating wind turbines connected to oil and gas assets for decreasing emissions by allowing switching off completely the gas turbines on the assets.
SME category
The other five companies: Ruden, ZEG Power, SolarDuck, Airbridge and ReStone are competing in the Small to Medium-size Enterprise (SME) category.
Norway’s Ruden was selected as a finalist thanks to its HEAT (high enthalpy aquifer technology) system, whch aims to provide clean energy storage for industrial plants, helping them to turn their waste heat into a seasonal productive resource.
Patented technologies
ZEG has developed and patented the ZEG ICC technology, which enables clean hydrogen production with integrated carbon capture.
Also competing in the SME award category is SolarDuck, which has developed and patented an offshore floating solar platform to bring solar PV to the seas that gained the world’s first certification by Bureau Veritas for offshore floating solar.
Airbridge is in contention with its Annulus Core Reactor carbon capture and utilisation technology, which aims to transform carbon emissions before they enter the atmosphere and repurpose them into global commodities.
Also among the finalists is ReStone with RePlug, its cement material for downhole applications.
The cement ingredient is based on environmentally safe mineral products, which when added to ordinary cement blends causes the matrix to self-heal when any water is present in the set cement.
In the last awards in 2018 — the 2020 event was cancelled because of the Covid-19 pandemic —Stavanger-based Interwell won the Innovation Award for its Thermite P&A Barrier, a rig-less well plug and abandonment technology that uses heat to create an artificial “rock” barrier in place of traditional cement plugs and tubing removal.
Typhonix, based in nearby Bryne, picked up the Innovation Award in the SME category for its Typhoon valve system, which reduces turbulence and shear forces in valves to give operators a more cost-effective and cleaner production.
