Last July Burntisland Fabrication (BiFab, itself a management buyout in 2001 after the Norwegian owned yard was mothballed) acquired the Arnish Construction Yard near Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis. This  month it dispatched the first four of 31 foundation steel jacket structures (45m high, 450 tonnes weight) from its Methil facility to the Vattenfall Ormonde Offshore Wind Farm being built in the Irish Sea, some 6.2 miles (10km) off Barrow-In-Furness. This will have 30 wind turbines with the jackets installed by craneship.

 "Loading out these jackets substructures represents a major milestone in our dealings with Vattenfall. The agreement to provide these jackets has helped to support more than 370 jobs at the Methil yard here at Fife Energy Park," says John Robertson, BiFab MD.

At Vattenfall Wind Power in the UK David Hodkinson, head of development (right) adds "The delivery of the jackets is an important development for our project in the Irish Sea and underlines Vattenfall's commitment to engage with  Scottish and UK economy and to assist in establishing a supply chain for the renewable energy sector."

Promenading turbine

Portobello Energy Descent and Land Reform (Pedal ), an environmental community group, has been awarded £72,000 from Community Energy Scotland (CES) to launch its bid to build the turbine on the promenade. The voluntary group, which includes a range of  experts covering law and finance among its 120 members, as well as those that work in the energy industry, will use the income from the turbine to pay off the £500,000 project costs.

PEDAL hopes to sell the power to local firms and invest the profits in community projects. It is in discussions with Lothian Buses to look at providing up to 100% of power to its Marine depot in Portobello and the nearby Seafield engineering works.

Tom Black, project manager with Pedal is on record that the inspiration came from rural area groups like Fintry in Stirlingshire and Eigg in the Hebrides, where they run their own wind turbines to give Portobellow its own renewable energy source. Pedal aims to submit the planning application next March, and hopes to begin building in early 2012, if permission is granted.

Steve Johnson, environmental manager at Lothian Buses, added: "We are currently in negotiation with Pedal in connection with its search for a suitable site for a wind turbine in Portobello. The project is in line with our own goals for developing more sustainable public transport within Edinburgh."

SSE teams MHI for renewable engineering

A strategic partnership by Scottish and Southern Energy and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to co-operate on low carbon energy developments will initially focus will on the delivery of renewable energy from offshore sites and the deployment of low carbon vehicles. 



The partners hopes to establish joint development projects, ventures, investments and supply arrangements. Through the co-operation agreement the partners will explore a range of technologies - including offshore wind farms, smart electricity grids, low carbon vehicles, carbon capture and high-efficiency power generation.

"This agreement represents one of the most significant industrial partnerships to be established in Scotland since the heyday of North Sea oil - low carbon energy represents Scotland's biggest economic opportunity since then," said SSE COO Colin Hood (left).

"As the UK's broadest-based energy company, SSE has extensive interests and opportunities in low carbon developments, and our partnership with Mitsubishi should help us to make the most of them."

The partnership expect to build on SSE's existing operations in the non-carbon sector, through its Centre of Engineering Excellence in Renewable Energy partnership (CEERE) with the University of Strathclyde, set up in 2009 but not as far advanced with University participation as the Centre for Ultrasonic Engineering (CUE).

However, CEERE has grown with over 300 skilled jobs being created over three years. Now through the Mitsubishi partnership a further 100 highly-skilled, engineering jobs will be created at the Centre which SSE believes may host as many as 1,000 new jobs over the next 5 years.