From iii board30 Sep 2011 23:27
By Iain Packham
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
LONDON (Dow Jones)--SeaEnergy PLC (SEA.LN), an offshore wind energy-focused business with oil and gas assets, hopes to launch a new business next year focused on manufacturing and installing jackets, or foundation substructures, for offshore wind farm turbines, Executive Chairman Steve Remp told Dow Jones Newswires Thursday.
Remp said he hopes to launch a new business in partnership with East Asian manufacturers, who will provide a large part of the capital. "We already have a relationship with a huge Chinese state-owned organization called NCSC [Nantong COSCO Ship Steel Structure Co.]," he said.
Remp added: "There are a number of these very big Far Eastern players desperate to enter the offshore wind market in Europe. I think we're perceived as a vehicle to do that."
His plan is to manufacture the jackets in East Asia, ship them flat-packed to shipyards in Scotland or North England, assemble them there and then install them offshore using specialized installation vessels.
He said the business will be profitable because of the size of the market and room for efficiency and cost reduction. Remp anticipates the need for around 9,000 jackets to be built over the next 15 to 20 years.
"A really advanced yard could probably do 200 jackets a year and that in itself is a big business," he said adding: "You're going to be building thousands of jackets, which are largely the same, that's where I see an enormous opportunity."
Remp said the business ideally needs to be set up early next year so the company can start bidding on jacket contracts for manufacturing to start by 2014.
Shares at 0905 GMT were up 0.4 pence, or 1.45%, at 26.35 pence in a slightly lower Alternative Investment Market--down 0.1%
Thanks to "Lupus prep lucrii".
_BW
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