New life for old assets in the oil industry, ocean exploration edition

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The oil services industry has transformed its skills and resources to accelerate the development of offshore wind. A particularly compelling example is the emergence of specialized service vessels to streamline wind farm construction. In an interesting twist, a former offshore oil research and support vessel has been scaled up for nature research and education, allowing the crew to see further and deeper than ever before.

A new life for an old oil exploration vessel

The oil vessel in question is the OceanXplorer, which has been extensively converted to serve as the organization's state-of-the-art research and exploration vessel. OceanX. You can see the ship put to the test in the new six-part series on ocean exploration, aptly titled Ocean explorers, Available to watch on National Geographic TV from August 18, followed by streaming on Disney+ and Hulu.

I had the chance to learn a little more about the ship and the show during a phone call with Eric Stackpole, who holds the title of Ocean Technology Innovator at OceanX.

We started by discussing the most important system on the ship. If you jumped ahead and guessed that Stackpole would focus on the human system, you were right. He made it clear that the team of leading experts on the ship was the most important factor that OceanXpolorers series to take shape.

In addition, Stackpole also noted the two manned “bubble subs,” which allow people to direct their own eyes at sights previously only visible through the lens of a camera.

“Not only can we go to places we've never seen before, we can go to a place that seems ordinary and we make [new] discoveries,” Stackpole said. He described how he and his crewmate found themselves in a deep abyss that seemed uninhabited until they flashed the submarine’s lights, and suddenly the area was populated with bioluminescent creatures that flashed back at them.

“It's not just where you look, it's how you look,” he said.

Regarding oil exploration, Stackpole noted that “we're getting to a point where we realize that the oil we have is even more valuable to understanding our planet.”

“We've built this ship into the ultimate understanding system… like the USS Enterprise, going where no one has gone before,” he said.

From offshore oil services to nature education

Seriously. OceanXplorer is billed as “the most advanced exploration, research and media vessel ever built.” It houses a total of four deep-sea vessels, along with a helicopter pad and four different laboratories that provide resources on a par with leading land-based research institutions, from microscopy and aquarium tanks to genetic sequencing and biofluorescence imaging.

“More is known about the surface of the moon than the seafloor here on Earth,” OceanX explains, introducing its sonar system.

“The array, also known as the nacelle, features two multi-beam systems, the Kongsberg EM712 and EM304, capable of mapping depths of up to 3,600 m (11,811 ft) and 6,000 m (19,685 ft) respectively,” OceanX explains.

“By working together with other sensors, including sensors that visualize the top layers of the seafloor substrate, currents, and biomass in the water column, these technologies provide scientists with all the data they need to deeply understand an entire ocean ecosystem from surface to seafloor,” they add.

The ship also outdoes itself in the media department, with features including a purpose-built camera housing that is the only one in the world capable of recording 8k resolution footage at depths of nearly 20,000 feet below the ocean surface.

See the OceanXplorer in action

Not to give any spoilers, but the Ocean explorers series really shows off all the bells and whistles aboard the OceanXplorer. The series kicks off on August 18 with “Realm of the Humpbacks,” which sees them travel to the Dominican Republic to unravel the mysteries of the migration and mating habits of the North Atlantic humpback whale. Also on August 18, more whales can be seen in the episode “Giants of the Deep,” which follows deep-diving whales all the way to hunting giant squid that lurk a mile beneath the surface of the Azores.

On August 25, it's shark time as the crew dives again in the Azores to follow the prehistoric sixgill shark on its deep-sea hunting trail in “Jurassic Shark,” before heading to the Bahamas to watch the hammerhead shark's long journey in “Hammerhead Highway.”

As expected, climate change is also a major concern. On September 1, the series moves to Svalbard, Norway for “Kingdom of the Polar Bear,” to assess how the bears are adapting to their changing environment. Also on September 1, the series concludes with “Ice Giants” at the tip of the Arctic ice cap, featuring Bowhead whales and the long-lived Greenland shark.

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More offshore vessels for the offshore wind industry

For the record: OceanXplorers is a co-production between BBC Studios Natural History Unit and OceanX for National Geographic, with James Cameron and Maria Wilhelm serving as executive producers on Lightstorm Earth. “The series was created in partnership with the National Geographic Society with a mission to use the power of science, exploration, education and storytelling to illuminate and protect the wonder of our world,” National Geographic reminds us.

Returning to the US offshore wind industry, it has not been that long since action was taken, despite the fact that almost the entire Atlantic coast offers ideal conditions, with relatively shallow water and coastal residents who consume a lot of energy.

During the Obama administration, the energy policy of state-based Republican officials (such as this guy) were among the major factors slowing the development of offshore wind energy along the Atlantic coast. Not much of interest happened during former President Trump's tenure, which is no surprise given his well-known antipathy toward offshore wind turbines.

It's somewhat ironic that during Trump's time in the White House, the US Department of the Interior took the opportunity to finalize a new, streamlined process for the granting of offshore lease areasThe new leasing process was managed by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and was already up and running when President Joe Biden took office in 2020.

That should have been the end of the obstruction, but last year saw a post-Covid inflationary push, leading to a flood of canceled contracts. Offshore wind development was also slowed — but not stopped — by a lack of compliant specialized service vessels in the U.S. Under a provision of the longstanding maritime defense law called the jones lawCommercial vessels carrying goods from one U.S. port to another must be built and owned by U.S. citizens or permanent residents.

Yes, that was then. The US offshore wind industry roars back this year and is Jones-compliant offshore wind service vessels are finally in the pipeline, an example of which is the huge Eco Edison Offshore SOV.

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Photo: The extensively equipped research vessel OceanXplorer is an example of the transition from oil industry assets to serving science, education and environmental initiatives (Courtesy of National Geographic/Mario Tadinac).