Søren Juel Petersen, Ramboll
Release Date: 2009-03-13
Ramboll is a leading provider of all-round consultancy services for wind projects, from development to commissioning of wind farms. How has the company achieved such a prominent position?More or less, we reached this position ‘by accident’. We started to work for the wind industry in 1986 when we developed the first turbine towers. After that we got involved in foundation design, electrical design, and then rapidly started developing projects worldwide. Today we are among the leading consulting engineers within the field of wind energy, with particular expertise in the development of new foundation concepts and foundation design for offshore wind turbines. When the offshore wind industry took off, we were able to get involved pretty early in because of our experience in the oil and gas business. We already had a lot of competence in this field, we are used to working in the ocean, which is a very harsh environment, so you need to design for that, and the rest is history.
You make it sound very easy, but other oil and gas companies also tried to enter the offshore wind industry because they thought they had the skills, as no one had had succeeded there yet… How did you manage to cross that gap then?
Ramboll is a multidisciplinary firm. We are also designers of bridges, ports, etc…Therefore, from this perspective, we know about mass production. Usually, an oil and gas platform is a ‘one up’ and it really doesn't matter if you're a bit conservative. But, the financial profiles of an oil and gas structure and an offshore wind project are very different. You really have got to be on your tiptoes to achieve financial feasibility, make sure that the project it is both profitable and feasible at the same time. We mixed elements, financial savvy and knowledge of mass production solutions in that the environment. Certainly we've seen a lot of solutions from oil and gas industry companies which are used to working in ‘one up’ projects, but that approach doesn’t work.
As the offshore wind industry is still relatively new, what would you say have been the biggest mistakes people have made in these years and which mistakes have you learned most from?
The biggest mistake I have seen is when companies used to designing things for land purposes start to design for offshore purposes. Some of the major mishaps we've seen originate from that because people are not used to designing for offshore purposes as it requires different ways of thinking.
Would this apply to you if you tried to design for onshore purposes? Is going from offshore to onshore easier than the other way around?
Well, we've been sort of working in both directions. We haven’t made any mistakes yet. Hopefully we won't, but it remains to be seen.
For many people, consultancy services for the wind industry could mean a million different things. More concretely, which type of services you offer, and how do you add value to your operations?
80% of our activities are about structural design. We add value by having extremely good in-house software. The advantage of it is that the structures we design get to be up to us and, because of that, very cheap, cheaper. It’s always relative what it's cheap or expensive, but, comparatively, our services are cheaper.
As the offshore wind industry grows, do you think there will be standardization, and, therefore, mass production, of offshore foundations in order to make things cheaper, or that they will continue to be customized?
Currently, we customize. We design each and every foundation in every field. We're the only doing this and this really does cut costs for a project. Today, it's still pretty hard to see how you could standardize. That would be quite costly. Standardization is more expensive because each wind turbine and environmental conditions are different. You may have different winds; you've got different waters, different wave heights, and different soil conditions. So it wouldn't really pay off.
People are talking about the development of very large offshore wind parks in Europe, which would provide major amounts of electricity. These are of course very expensive projects which might be a bit delayed in the current situation. What are your expectations for the development of this market? What is the potential of the US, India and China?
As far as I can see, the growth of the offshore market will primarily come from Europe and mainly from the UK. It looks like UK will account for 50% of the European market by 2020, and the other 50% will come from mainland Europe. The US, with its plans for renewable portfolio standards, will be the second biggest market. I don't think we'll see much offshore in the coming years in India and China. There are some plans close to Shanghai and Hong Kong, but still the electricity coming from offshore wind is more expensive. I would suspect that both India and China would focus a lot more on onshore, and then take the cost of creating the electrical infrastructure. In China you've got the deserts, petroleum reserves - I don't know how many, but I am sure that it’s a lot. And then, you've got to create the grid, so I think it'll take some time. Offshore is still our niche market and this explains why we're not more active in China.
Ramboll is involved in a big offshore project in London. Do you think that the situation in Shanghai is very similar to the situation in London as there are both large cities with wind potential? Which kind of opportunities do you see?
Of course that could be an opportunity. We have been in dialogue with some developers in the Chinese markets. Our experience is that the Chinese would very much like to do it themselves, and that means would very rapidly, and a very strong competition. The Chinese are pretty low cost compared to us, or we are very expensive compared to them; depends how you put it. So we don't really see a market, not a big one, not for European consulting. It could be a European consultant, for instance, having a Chinese partner, but that would probably be the only way. We were in competition with Garrad Hassan for a Chinese project, and the rates were uninteresting for a European firm. Garrad Hassan made use of their Chinese office, so it was not really possible to beat them. Also, you would get very little experience transferred from European projects if you got only Chinese staff. Unfortunately, I do not see a big market for the time being, though things may change.
What do you believe are the main lessons the Chinese have already learned from the way things are done here in Europe?
Their curve of development can go and does go a lot faster than the European one. They can make so many shortcuts, because they have learned from all the mistakes that we, Europeans, have done. It has taking us a lot of time to get to where we are now, and that would save both the Chinese and the Indians from a lot of mistakes. I think that's the lesson learned.
Governments of those countries are interested in facilitating cooperation in these areas in order to learn from each other. To which extent would you be interested in participating in such cooperation or an intellectual exchange? Or you'd worry very much about your intellectual property?
We would be extremely interested to cooperate but of course we would be worried about our intellectual property. I’ll give you an example; some of my colleagues were working with a Chinese firm, which owed only one license for their 3-D CAD software, but hundreds of people were using that software. The problem is that it is quite difficult to stand up and fight your intellectual property rights if your are far away and this is not just applicable to China but to many other countries, except for the US where they are really careful. The further we move away from home, the greater the risk.
Having been such a dominant player in the European market, would it be interesting for you to set up local facilities in the US, India and China? Is this taken into consideration for Ramboll’s future strategy?
Ramboll has got offices in Denmark and we have just opened an office in London. We also have an office in in India but not for our wind division. We are currently looking at setting up an office in the US in the near future, and I don't know if that what's going to happen in China, but I guarantee you that there are thoughts. Our wind divisions in the US and India are part of the oil and gas division. We do have offices in India and we've talked about reinforcing our resources by making use of the Indian offices. We put in a proposal for a project with a very tight schedule, and thought that if we involved the Indian employees as well, we'd be working almost round-the-clock. We hope to continue with this geographical expansion and, who knows, perhaps one day we will even open an office in China.
What does it take to compete internationally with so many players entering the market from all over the world, for instance Indian engineering firms?
To maintain our international strategy in the department, we've got eleven nationalities in the department, amongst others, Chinese and Indians. We're able and capable of speaking Chinese with the Chinese. We know about their culture (…) If we want to compete in an international environment want to prepare ourselves, and part of that is learning and culture and language. We cannot isolate ourselves.
What would you the readers of International Business Daily about the development of the wind industry in China and future cooperation with Ramboll?
I would tell them to keep up the good work. We'll be happy to help and cooperate with the Chinese market as much as possible in the coming future.
| Company: | Ramboll |
| Position: | Director |
| Country: | Denmark |