Ordtek founder Lee Gooderham will present how new technology can help pinpoint unexploded mines, bombs and missiles at new offshore energy sites during the Innovations in Surveying the Marine Environment symposium in Norwich on Thursday, June 9.
Gooderham will outline how gadgets using 3D “chirps”, electromagnetic sensors, and special sonar are spotting Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) in challenging conditions, and are helping to clear offshore wind farm and cabling sites.
Traditional technology used for the past 20 years includes magnetometers, side-scan sensors and multi-beam echo sounders which work well in normal conditions.
But there are times when new technology can help overcome complex challenges and allow the UXO risk to be managed, including aluminium ground mines used by the Germans in the Second World War to evade traditional mine detecting; poor visibility through silty waters, particularly in bad weather; and large magnetic fields, such as wrecks and seabed debris, which could mask pieces of UXO.
Gooderham will give a presentation about possible solutions using new technology to the event at Norwich City Football Club.
The chirp equipment penetrates the sea or riverbed to find buried UXO such as aluminium mines up to 7 metres deep.
ROV-mounted sonar provides “night vision” style insights into silty water that would normally mean waiting for the weather to improve.
And electromagnetic sensors on submersible survey vessels help to spot metal UXO including aluminium in busy magnetic areas.
“For operators it means less waiting on the weather, more productivity, quicker UXO sign-offs and opens up more areas of the seabed for development,” Gooderham said.
Ordtek is based at Eye near Diss and the OrbisEnergy centre at Lowestoft. The company is currently working on a range of offshore renewables projects including Galloper off Suffolk, Walney off Cumbria, Hornsea off Yorkshire and Rampion off Sussex.
The symposium is being staged by the East of England Energy Group’s Marine Special Interest Group in conjunction with the regional Hydrographic Society and IMarEST.
Other speakers include ScottishPower Renewables, Gardline, Innovatum, James Fisher Subsea, Subsea7/i-tech, EdgeTech, Maritime and Coastguard Agency, EDF Energy and CEFAS.