A Breakthrough in Offshore Wind Inspections
Beam, a leader in high-tech offshore wind services, has reached a remarkable milestone by deploying the world’s first autonomous underwater vehicle driven by artificial intelligence (AI). This state-of-the-art technology has already been successfully employed in inspecting jacket structures at Seagreen wind farm—Scotland’s largest offshore site and a joint venture between SSE Renewables, TotalEnergies, and PTTEP.
Beam’s innovative AI-driven technology is set to revolutionise marine technology and underwater robotics. The vehicle can conduct complex underwater inspections without any human intervention, significantly increasing the efficiency and reducing the costs of underwater surveys and inspections.
Transforming Underwater Inspections in Offshore Wind
Offshore wind site inspections are traditionally manual, labor-intensive processes. Beam’s AI-powered vehicle offers a fully autonomous solution, allowing data to be streamed directly back to shore. This shift enables offshore workers to focus on more complex tasks and reduces inspection timelines by up to 50%, cutting operational costs substantially. In addition to improving efficiency, Beam’s technology also enhances the quality of inspection data and enables the creation of 3D reconstructions of assets alongside visual data.
This deployment is a major step in Beam’s roadmap for autonomous technology. The company is set to roll out this AI-driven solution across its fleet of DP2 vessels, ROVs, and autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) throughout 2025 and 2026.
CEO Brian Allen on Beam’s Breakthrough
“We are very proud to have succeeded in deploying the world’s first autonomous underwater vehicle driven by AI. Automation can revolutionise how we carry out inspection and maintenance of offshore wind farms, helping to reduce both costs and timelines. Looking ahead to the future, the potential of this technology is huge for the industry, and success in these initial projects is vital for us to progress and realise this vision. This wouldn’t be possible without forward-thinking customers like SSE Renewables who are willing to go on the journey with us.”
Seagreen Wind Farm: A Learning Opportunity for the Industry
Seagreen wind farm, operational since October 2023, is the world’s deepest fixed-bottom offshore wind farm. Beam’s project at Seagreen has yielded critical insights into the potential of autonomous technology for large offshore wind superstructures. The data gathered by Beam’s AI-driven vehicle will support ongoing operational reliability at the site, offering valuable information on areas such as marine growth and potential erosion at the foundations.
Matthew Henderson, Technical Asset Manager – Substructure and Asset Lifecycle at SSE Renewables, emphasised the importance of this technology for the industry:
“At SSE, we have a mantra that ‘if it’s not safe, we don’t do it.’ Beam’s technology demonstrates that autonomous inspections can reduce the personnel we need to send offshore for planned inspections, while speeding up planned works and collecting rich data-sets to inform asset integrity planning. As we move further offshore, and into deeper waters – the ability to collect high-quality inspection data in a low-risk manner is imperative to us delivering our Net Zero Acceleration Programme.”
The Future of Offshore Wind Inspections
Beam is poised to roll out this groundbreaking AI-driven inspection technology across its fleet in 2025 and 2026. This deployment aligns with the company’s mission to revolutionise offshore wind operations by making them more efficient and cost-effective, further supporting the global energy transition.
