The report, ‘Jack-up vessel optimisation’, collaborated with the wind industry to find common challenges and opportunities in order to make recommendations for improving repair times, reducing repair cost and addressing risks.
It says better collaboration between wind farm owners in chartering jack-up vessels may help to lower costs.
The report suggests a flexible charter club, through which owners can pre-plan to share vessels without engaging a full-time shared vessel.
The Crown Estate offshore wind head Huub den Rooijen said: "We have been a major player in the development of the offshore wind industry for over 10 years and seen significant growth in that time to the point where there are now economies of scale to be found in the effective use of jack-up vessels.
"This report is part of our strategy to encourage the industry to work together where appropriate to help bring down costs."
The Crown Estate claims that over 500 jack-up vessel interventions have been made to date at the operational offshore wind farms in the UK, and long periods of turbine downtime can occur while repair campaigns, costing millions of pounds in lost revenue.
The improvements could bring down maintenance costs by about £110m a year in the existing wind farms.
Image: Leviathan-working-on-sheringham-shoal. Photo: Courtesy of The Crown Estate.
