French shipyard Piriou has announced it is one of three winners of a call for notification of interest from the Offshore Wind Innovation Challenge – managed by WPD and the Brittany Maritime Cluster – Pôle Mer Bretagne Atlantique – thanks to its Crew Transfer Vessel (CTV) with hydrogen hybrid propulsion. WPD is a Germany-based specialist in offshore wind-energy generation; the Brittany Maritime Cluster is an innovation cluster tasked with developing technologies for emerging marine markets.
Following a call for proposals launched at the end of 2019, Piriou drew on its experience in crew transfer to oil fields, having delivered more than 100 18-55m crew boats and 10 27m and 22m CTVs for wind farms, broadening its range with an H2 low-emission CTV design. The 22m vessels will have a maximum speed of 25kts, with power provided by a pair of 1,000kW main engines and two 140kW fuel cells, with their fuel stored in 6m-long containers.
Vincent Faujour, Piriou Group CEO, commented, “We deeply thank WPD and the Maritime Cluster for awarding this prize, and commend the relevance of the project and the quality of the work done by the Piriou design office teams. This award allows us to benefit from the support and experience of WPD – a major player in offshore wind – to complete our project up to commercialization.”
