Flying Basket, an Italian company among the major European players in the development of heavy-lift cargo drones, was a key player in a British project for deliveries to offshore wind farms, which turned out to be the largest ever conducted in the United Kingdom. In the initiative, the company, based in Bolzano, collaborated with Skylift Uav, a British drone operator, and with Ørsted, a Danish company in the renewable energy sector.
The project, a press release explains, has already seen the completion of over 600 flights, transporting 38.1 tonnes of equipment to more than 400 wind turbines at the Hornsea 1 & 2 wind farms, off the east coast of England, and Walney 1 & 2, in the Irish Sea. With turbines located up to 75 miles (121 km) from the coast, the delivery program was indeed the largest ever carried out with drones in the offshore wind sector.
Compared to traditional methods, the partners explain, the impact has been “enormous” in terms of reducing time, costs, emissions, and safety risks. Specifically, the use of UAVs required 60 vessel days compared to the 535 usually needed with conventional systems. Ørsted also highlighted that the campaign proved to be more than ten times more cost-effective than traditional ones. Finally, the use of drones resulted in personnel safety risk exposure on the order of one minute per operation, compared to the 50 minutes associated with the use of cranes.
“Seeing our cargo drones transport tonnes of materials in the energy sector is a demonstration not only of technological progress, but also of the strength of teamwork and perseverance. A vision that is already transforming offshore operations today,” commented the CEO of FlyingBasket, Moritz Moroder.
Specifically, the project employed FlyingBasket’s FB3 drones, with a transport capacity of up to 100 kg, which made deliveries with average loads of 70 kg from the deck of support vessels to the turbine nacelles, approximately 100 meters above sea level.
The vehicles, which can perform up to 30 missions per day, set a record of 40 deliveries in a single day. This summer alone, in just 6 and a half weeks, adds the Flying Basket press release, 31.7 tonnes of materials were transported in 550 flights to over 400 turbines in production. A further advantage, the release continues, is linked to the fact that drones enable operations without interruptions, i.e., even on turbines in production, ensuring that the generation of renewable energy continues without delays.
The British project follows a similar initiative that took place in the Netherlands, where 5 tonnes of equipment were delivered in 10 days, and underscores, according to Flying Basket, “the scalability of drone operations in the offshore energy sector. With the rapid expansion of the open-sea wind industry, drone logistics is set to become a pillar of safe, efficient, and sustainable operations.”
