Floating wind and green hydrogen - fostering future Scottish-French research and development collaboration: report

Conclusions and recommendations

This report has summarised analysis of the policy contexts and innovation landscapes influencing the development of floating wind and hydrogen projects in Scotland and in France. It has shown the important influence of national strategies on the shaping of innovation programmes delivering projects in these sectors, and at their interface. This analysis has pointed to commonalities between successful projects, which have inspired subsequent activity with ever-increasing ambition for these vital energy system sectors. Furthermore, this study has identified technical challenges and innovation needs in common between these sectors and shared by organisations in Scotland and in France.

Through engaging with supply chain organisations through questionnaires, expert interviews, and workshops, the project team have also elicited feedback regarding stakeholder experience of collaborative innovation programmes. These activities have highlighted a clear participant preference for initiatives aiming to support Franco-Scottish collaboration in these sectors to focus on delivering demonstration projects and, in particular, to consider how the two technologies should best be integrated in practice. Stakeholders also shared reflections on the best means of facilitating future collaboration and expressed interest in initiatives focused both on building connections between the French and Scottish supply chains, as well as in sharing knowledge between participant organisations.

This study was intended to provide recommendations to the Scottish Government regarding how future collaborative innovation activity between Scottish and French stakeholders might best be supported. This study has sought to interrogate the degree to which ambitions, opportunities and innovation challenges are shared between the two nations, to inform future activities. Policy statements, position papers and strategies in the two countries both have a focus on supporting research, development and innovation activities to facilitate cost reductions in the target technologies, and to resolve outstanding technical challenges which may otherwise impede deployments. Furthermore, both countries have articulated high relative ambitions for financially supporting deployments of both floating wind and hydrogen production capacity. However, as noted in our survey in the preceding sections, floating wind is arguably a more commercially mature prospect in Scotland so there is some difference in the scale of readiness between the Scottish and French sectors, and the supporting supply chains. The other inequality worth highlighting between the two nations is one of scale: the French state is much larger than Scotland, being a nation state with a sovereign government, and, as a result, has greater resources available both from a fiscal and political autonomy perspectives. In the current constitutional framework in Scotland, it may be more pertinent for the Scottish Government to engage bilaterally with French regions, which are more closely aligned to Scotland in terms of scale and resources, as well as in terms of ambition for the target sectors.

Recommendations

In order to promote Franco-Scottish collaboration in the floating wind and hydrogen sectors, the Scottish Government could:

1. Target engagement at regional levels in France: in recognition of shared ambitions and comparable priorities, work with like-minded authorities and development agencies in leading French regions. Brittany and Occitanie both have well-developed plans for both floating wind and hydrogen, as well as developed supply chains which preliminary feedback suggests may be very complementary to that of organisations in Scotland. Representatives from both regions engaged very constructively with the project team throughout the delivery of this study and their feedback has helped to shape these recommendations.

A useful first step would be to develop opportunities for structured networking and knowledge exchange for organisations in Scotland and in Brittany and/or Occitanie. The activities underpinning this recommendation are developed further below.

Given the relative position of leadership which Scotland enjoys in floating wind (and to a lesser extent hydrogen), there are likely to be a range of ‘lessons learned’ which Scottish organisations and developers could share with French counterparts in these regions. The developers of the initial floating wind projects highlighted in preceding sections of this report could be invited to share experiences with stakeholders in Brittany and Occitanie, alongside the research organisations and technology providers who have supported their efforts. Furthermore, there is fertile ground for joint initiatives and knowledge exchange opportunities in hydrogen, particularly when seeking to leverage Breton and Occitan experience in developing supply chain capacities in logistics. As noted in the recommendations which follow, these knowledge exchange initiatives should be structured to enable participants to better understand key supply chain strengths in Scotland, Brittany and Occitanie, respectively. A key means of approaching this could involve inviting industry organisations to share innovation case studies with one another.

Some stakeholders engaged through the project also requested a more formalised supply chain matchmaking approach, whereby organisations in Scotland could be directly introduced to potential partners in the target French region(s) based upon defined needs. This could build upon work undertaken for the Scottish Enterprise offshore wind to hydrogen opportunity assessment published in 2020 ^[17].

Fully implementing this recommendation would require both short and long term planning and investment. Networking activities seeking to kickstart engagement between private sector organisations in Scotland and in Brittany/Occitanie should be pursued as soon as is practical. However, there is good scope for the Scottish Government and Scottish Development International to build more strategic and long term inter-governmental and inter-agency relationships in pursuit of shared goals with authorities and agencies in the two French regions. Doing so would likely contribute to ensuring future impact for the initiatives proposed below.

2. Encourage research collaboration through network building: encourage partnerships between private and public sector research organisations in Scotland, Brittany and Occitanie, in order that key stakeholders are primed to work together to seize emerging commercial opportunities in both countries. This recommendation builds upon the first and is based upon clear stakeholder feedback which recognised the importance of relationship building in enabling future joint working.

In practical terms, this could involve providing or facilitating further matchmaking support to private sector organisations, or perhaps providing market intelligence through economic development agencies. Stakeholder feedback suggested that matchmaking through trade delegations and facilitated workshops would be appreciated to help to build connections between Scottish and French organisations in different parts of the hydrogen and floating wind value chains. Facilitated matchmaking would best be informed by an exercise in understanding supply chain strengths in Scotland and in Brittany/Occitanie. Stakeholder interest in such an exercise is reinforced in the perceptions which informed Recommendation 4, in regards to evaluating transferrable strengths in allied sectors such as oil and gas services. Stakeholders referred to sub-sea engineering as a specific Scottish supply chain strength, for example. Further detail on comparative strengths and opportunities for joint working could be elaborated through targeted engagement as well as collaboration between enterprise agencies in Scotland, Brittany and Occitanie.

Building upon stakeholder feedback regarding the challenges of trying to develop innovation opportunities alongside more commercially orientated work, there could be scope for funding knowledge exchange placements for both private and public sector professionals as well as students/academics, or secondments of staff between Scottish and French organisations. An additional strand in this activity could focus on providing opportunities for project developers to explore opportunities for greater import/export of components, systems and hydrogen itself between the two countries through feasibility studies. Stakeholders in both countries identified commercial and business case barriers as key challenges, so participant interest in such initiative is likely to be high.

3. Develop a research, test and demonstration platform specifically targeting projects showcasing the integration of floating wind and hydrogen systems, in order to draw on a broad range of complementary experience in Scotland and in France. Scottish organisations are arguably currently leading in deploying these technologies and systems. However, as a result of sustained innovation activity, a number of promising early-stage French developers of novel solutions in these sectors are emerging. An opportunity may exist to leverage complementary experience in the two countries to encourage more efficient and cost-effective development.

Specifically, this platform should target research and demonstration activities which can contribute to addressing the technical challenges highlighted in the evidence review narrated above, as well as those discussed in the stakeholder feedback summarised. Recognising that a wide range of challenges have been identified, the platform should focus on addressing a shortlist of these, and ideally prioritise those which are of greatest interest to both Scottish and French supply chains. The following areas of focus were prominent in stakeholder discussions undertaken in delivering this project:

• At a component level, stakeholders expressed interest in seeing further opportunities to research, develop and demonstrate novel floating platform systems and the components required to secure these. Although most naturally targeted at floating wind turbines, a research programme concerning these platforms could also look to explore the best means of supporting offshore electrolysis plants.
• At systems level, the primary research needs which stakeholders raised referred to the integration of hydrogen and floating wind technologies. Some stakeholders suggested that it is too early in the development of these technologies to consider integrating them together in practice. Others stated that this relative immaturity is exactly why research and demonstration activities should focus on testing hydrogen and floating wind co-deployments.

There are multiple possible approaches to addressing this feedback and these research needs, with the most appropriate option depending on Scottish Government policy priorities and resources. Some desk-based feasibility study work analysing the technicalities of the best approach to integrating floating wind and hydrogen could be undertaken collaboratively with French supply chain partners. This would likely look to assess the technical readiness of the components, systems and working practices which would be required in various deployment scenarios (hydrogen produced onshore with direct power connection to a floating wind farm, hydrogen produced offshore from a centralised floating electrolyser platform, or electrolyser integration on-board individual floating wind turbine platforms). Building upon this, stakeholders were very enthusiastic about the prospects of collaborative testing and demonstration regimes involving Scottish and French partners, which would seek to deploy systems in the above configurations to test these in practice.

• Non-technical research needs have also been defined, suggesting significant stakeholder interest in exploring the market dynamics associated with integrating the two technologies. Feedback provided to the project team suggested that there would be significant merit in collaborative desk-based research studies which could identify international market opportunities for hydrogen produced from floating wind power. These studies could also consider aspects such as investment readiness and insurability of such projects. Consenting risks were also highlighted by stakeholders, along with a number of health and safety considerations discussed in prior sections which could warrant collaborative feasibility study work.

Stakeholder feedback suggested that a joint-industry project approach would be favoured for delivering work within any joint research and development platform. In practice this would likely mean Scottish Government appointing a programme management organisation and providing funding which could be distributed to a range of projects either proposed or co-sponsored by industry organisations. This programme could pick up on a number of different themes in terms of the research areas highlighted.

Looking to the timescale for such an initiative, the organisations who fed into the project team were clear in their recommendation for these measures to be pursued as soon as possible. These activities are anticipated to support commercialisation and technology deployment by contributing to de-risking in the two target markets. In practice the range of project timescales will vary according to the scale of ambition for the programme. It may be prudent to conduct activities across phases or streams, to invite a broad range of desk-based research and feasibility studies in a first phase over the course of six months. This phase could then be followed by demonstration activities which could be expected to take place over a longer time frame, in the course of multi-annual projects, perhaps running for up to three years.

4. Instil a focus on ‘Just Transition’ and skills development in these initiatives. Stakeholders in both countries expressed a strong desire to see demonstration initiatives in these sectors leverage existing supply chain competence and skills which can be translated from well-developed oil and gas sectors. This is a clear, shared priority for stakeholders and an ideal focal point for collaboration and knowledge exchange. This recommendation is largely a supportive element expected to broaden the impact of the adoption of the other recommendations; for example, a knowledge exchange or cluster-building scheme with a sub-focus on skills development and supply chain transferability could deliver against various policy objectives simultaneously. Similarly, any initiative under the research, test and demonstration platform could include a specific incentive for project consortia to include partners transitioning from the conventional energy supply chain and working in new areas, to embed ‘Just Transition’ outcomes in the programme design.

Stakeholders queried whether substantive reviews had been undertaken to understand the competitiveness and ease of transferability (to floating wind and hydrogen) of oil and gas service providers and supply chains in the two countries. Delivering such an analysis focused on comparing organisations in Scotland and Brittany and/or Occitanie could facilitate further collaboration in the future by identifying collaborative areas of strength (and areas in which each respective supply chain could be bolstered by the others).

Next steps

As noted already, both Scottish and French stakeholders shared resoundingly positive feedback regarding the prospects for the two supply chains coming together to solve shared challenges as the floating wind and hydrogen sectors mature. There is great scope for collaborative working towards achieving shared aims and realising the high ambition for the contribution that floating wind and hydrogen can make to the energy transition in both countries. If adopted, the recommendations outlined here could help to ensure that Scottish supply chain organisations can seize the opportunities presented in these vital sectors.