Floating Energy Islands, Hydrogen, and Sustainable Sea-living

Floating Energy Islands, Hydrogen, and Sustainable Sea-living

This is an executive summary detailing the need for Floating Energy Hubs in Offshore Wind Farms and showing a comprehensive pathway to the 2030 Green Hydrogen marine energy transition target by adopting Beirut International Marine Industry’s floating island technology developed by Dr. Abdullah Daou and approved by international Marine Classification Societies.

Simultaneously enabling sustainable sea living, and safer maritime navigation.

 By Sumer Daou for Beirut International Marine Industry and Commerce

1- Offshore Wind, Offshore Currents, Offshore Waves:

The higher efficiency and consistency in offshore energy generation explains the higher cost of initial investment. Various floating systems are now at prototype or early implementation stages in wind turbines, seawater currents turbines, and surface wave movement to convert these abundant consistent renewable energies into electrical currents.

In deep waters, 50km far and more from coastlines, a floating energy hub is essential to collect the electric current from the floating devices and invert it to higher voltage to minimize the loss in power cables transfer. 

Backfilling is not an option at such depths.

To put scale into perspective, a 1 GW offshore wind farm consists of 66 floating wind turbines  15 MW each stationed at 2km apart, this would form a rectangular grid roughly 12km wide by 22 km long using a 242 square km surface area. Even though the oceans are of huge surfaces, such a space cannot be haphazardly selected, take the case of the Baltic sea, between environmentally protected areas, oil & gaz zones, military zones, fishing grounds, and maritime routes, there is enough space left to fit only a few 1 GW size farms.

2- Offshore Renewable Energy Storage:

Hydrogen is being considered as a viable storage medium for offshore energy, in liquid, compressed gas or ammonia depending on the application. In all three forms making Hydrogen from seawater needs a processing plant.

The weight and size of 1 GW equivalent plant, that would produce between 50,000 and 70,000 tons of Hydrogen per year depending on the processing technology, as designed by various technology providers, weighs in the tens of thousands of tons, and occupies a space between 20,000 and 100,000 sqm depending on the industrial architecture. This would be the dimensions of the floating energy hub. One reference on this is the Hydrogen Innovation hub public report entitled: “A One-Gigawatt Green Hydrogen Plant”.

It is estimated that a 1GW green hydrogen saves 700,000 tons of CO2 emissions per year, and 120 million USD in environmental damages, referring to the Federal Environment Agency (UBA) report in the Clean Energy Wire.

Hydrogen would have to be transferred to ships either for direct refueling, or to be transported on land. For navigation safety, the floating energy island is better be positioned on the edge of the 242 square kilometer of the energy farm, to avoids navigation between the turbines. One anchor point would hold it in location, and the electric cables from the renewable energy generators would meet at the anchoring point and hook up to the floating island.

The Hydrogen processing plant consists of ultra-pure water makers, cooling water makers, green source electricity rectifiers, water electrolises, hydrogen compression, storage, and further processing.

The Green Hydrogen process is soundless, odorless, emission free, and require a minimal team; this would make the tens of thousands of square meters of roof decks available to be safely used in developing a community.

3- Hydrogen, Ultra-Pure Water, and Cooling Water:

It takes 3.3 cubic meter of sea water to make 1 cubic meter of ultrapure water ready for electrolysis, and it takes 9 cubic meters of ultrapure water to make 1 ton of hydrogen, referring to Eurowater report “Water treatment for Green Hydrogen”.

Therefore 1 ton of Hydrogen needs 30 cubic meters of seawater. A 1 GW plant needs 200 m3/h ultra-pure water, or 660 m3/hour seawater, and 400 m3/h cooling water which is seawater treated to a lesser degree, these are indicative values to show the volume of water required, they vary depending on the selected electrolysis process.

Europe is planning to have 40GW electrolysis capacity by 2030, you can get an idea of the load impact on municipal water if fresh water sources is used, and the environmental impact on coastal fishing grounds if littoral sea water intake and discharge is assumed. A deep-water floating hydrogen plants may be an optimal solution to solve both issues with maximum efficiency and minimal environmental impact.

4- Beirut International Floating Island, a Technical Solution:

Dr. Abdullah Daou started his personally funded floating island research in 1980, in 1997 he invested half a million dollars within that year with a team of 30 technicians and made a 1:10 scale floating island the size of a dinning room, and tested it successfully in a make shift water basin in his house in Bennay, Lebanon.

The prototype stability under 8m equivalent wave heights is unmatched by any floating structure to date.

A marathonic 9 hours meeting at Bureau Veritas old head office in La Defense in Paris on 29 June 2005 attended by 12 head of sections from Bureau Veritas ended with a three pages Minutes of Meeting, and the following introduction: “Beirut International Marine Industry presents the Floating Island in terms of structures, stability and hydrodynamic matters. Philosophy and design principles have been detailed by Dr. Daou”

Bureau Veritas Conclusion is: “As a general conclusion attendee agree about the technical feasibility of this Floating Island for the structure and stability parts.”

 As of 2014, Beirut International 391 technicians and engineers team made a floating island 80m long by 50m wide weighting 5000 tons of steel and fiberglass, designed, manufactured and assembled in Lebanon, under the surveying of International Naval Survey Bureau INSB from Greece. The intellectual property was checked and approved by INSB, the design calculation, fabrication drawings, material purchases, fabrication in workshop, and assembly on site was checked approved and stamped by INSB as per SOLAS regulations.

Beirut International fabrication process relied on cutting edge CNC technologies, latest steel and polymers material, a unique design and assembly process, these combined factors led to a minimized materials wastage, and reduced embodied energy footprint. If a comparison is to be made based on the Sustainable Shipping Initiative report “Exploring Shipping’s Transition to a Circular Economy” the Beirut International Floating Island meets and exceed the report’s recommendations, and is ahead of any other marine industry.

To date Beirut International floating island made the only floating solution with a proven prototype simulation, approved by two international Marine Classifications societies, and with a completed extensive design and fabrication learning curve.

It floats.

It is stable.

It is sustainably manufactured.

5- Sea Living and Sustainability Challenges:

Top architectural firms have been competing in presenting unrealistic floating island concepts, and the term “sustainable” is being “loosely” used. Google floating island and you would see some. Why and how the Beirut International Hydrogen Floating Port is a valid solution?

The floating technology is covered in section 4 above, and in tons of documentations for the interested to immerse in. However, it is not enough to float and be stable, it has to be truly sustainable to last.

Before green hydrogen, the need to regularly supply ships with diesel supply killed the energy sustainability of any floating structure (unless nuclear power is used, NuScale Power is a promising solution). Green hydrogen made an everlasting stay at sea without energy refueling possible; in addition, the green hydrogen process provides fresh water, and this creates the beginning of a sustainable living.

By having continuous energy supply, and fresh water, the roof decks of the Hydrogen Floating Islands can accommodate spacious habitats, and Agri-Voltaic plantation for vegetables, orchards and poultry, making daily fresh food supply for a calculated population, it has been tested that 16 sqm of land space can feed one person. The substructure of the Beirut International Island is an open water volume ideal for fisheries, enough to supply the population and make a good return on fish sale as well.

Main food sources such as wheat, sugar, coffee can be stored for long duration and would be shipped in the same as most importing countries do today.

Treated waste water would be a sustainable irrigation source for orchards and vegetation.

6- Floating Hydrogen Port and Marine Routes:

The Atlantic trade route carried Christopher Columbus to the Bahamas in 1492, to day this route helps modern ship save on energy by cruising with the wind and sea currents. In addition, about fifteen hundred sailing yachts yearly venture on this vast 3600 nautical miles journey.

Shipping transition to hydrogen is happening faster than any other sector, the transport of hydrogen is a costly part of the hydrogen process, and hydrogen fuel storage needs to be balanced with container space (Refer to Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Center for Zero Carbon Shipping report “Preparing Container Vessel for Conversion to Green Fuels”), therefore a Green Hydrogen refueling port in the middle of the Seas and Oceans is a favorable solution.

Beirut International Floating Hydrogen Port can contribute in optimizing marine refueling, and simultaneously create a safe space for smaller ships and yachts, while developing the first self-sustainable sea living community.

The post-covid era created an awareness in the services sector, yacht charted increased by 53.7% in 2022 (Refer to Interconnecting Consulting report “Key Figures of the Global Pleasure Boating Market”), and digital nomads discovered that travel and tourism is no longer a money drain, its is becoming a source of income. The development of small hybrid hydrogen yachts is creating a new marine travelers’ generation.

 7- When to invest in Beirut International Floating Island?

Green Hydrogen at sea is at the chicken and egg phase today. If the shipping transition does not occur on time, the Floating Hydrogen Port will become a supply without demand. If the Floating Hydrogen Port is delayed, the green corridors would lose an empowering solution.

“The Next Wave Green Corridors”, a special report for Getting to Zero Coalition, made in partnership with McKinsey & Company may be one of the good comprehensive reports detailing the hydrogen status.

The nature of shipbuilding, and the marine society rules and regulations, makes the launching of a floating hydrogen port the responsibility of the floating solution designer, Beirut International in this case. The Green Hydrogen Facility needs to be designed and installed in direct coordination with Beirut International, who have to also design the living habitats, the port facilities, and all the components of the Floating Island.

The offshore energy generating systems: Offshore wind, waves and currents would have to be directly coordinated with Beirut International as well, for anchoring, cables, and maintenance teams and tooling requirements.

The scale of this floating structure being in the tens of thousands of square meters, surrounded by a 250 square km energy farm is unprecedented is size and complexity, with many new technologies involved, a realistic approach is a Joint Venture formed by the various stockholders necessary to create this project (Refer to Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer article “Joint venture partnering on renewable energy projects”).

Technology makers, energy companies, shipping companies, logistics companies, electrolysis makers, water maker companies, insurance companies, offshore wind turbine makes, water current turbine makers, wave energy makers, electric power companies, consulting firms, legal firms, marine classification societies, marine contractors, and shipyards are among potential stakeholder in this project.

In time scale, assuming we start the first day of 2023, for the potential stakeholders to get to know each other it would take about six months of meetings, add another six months to form a legal entity and pitch a round one of funding it would be 2024.

Design and Fabrication of a test Floating Hydrogen Island on an agreed to scale would take one to two years, to be launched in 2026.

Round two of funding for a 1GW or more Floating Hydrogen Port, design, fabrication and installation would take three to four years: 2030, on time with all the hydrogen transition literature.

It is advisable to start today.                                                                             

Sumer Daou                    Email: sumerdaou@gmail.com          Mobile: 00961 3 293322