A & P FA L M O U T H
A&P FALMOUTH
Ship Repair Expertise Vital to Energy Future PRODUCTION: Timothy Reeder
With seven dry docks across four strategic locations in the UK, A&P Group’s rich heritage of marine engineering skills and experience combines to deliver global engineering excellence to the commercial shipping, marine, offshore wind and oil and gas industries across the UK. Home to one of the world’s largest natural deep-water harbours, A&P Falmouth is the largest ship-repair complex in the UK and has just been declared Fit For Nuclear (F4N), paving the way for diversification into the civil new build nuclear market. 2 / www.emea-energy.net
Adonia at Falmouth in 2012 © A&P Falmouth
INDUSTRY FOCUS: MARINE ENGINEERING
Falmouth Docks © A&P Falmouth
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On its way to becoming the largest commercial ship repair and conversion specialist in the UK, A&P has earned an enviable reputation for delivering engineering strength across the commercial marine, major fabrication and defence sectors, pairing a highly skilled workforce and management team with first class waterfront engineering infrastructure and exceptional customer focus. “Global ship repair, conversion and marine specialist A&P Group has a proud history of quality-driven engineering and marine excellence spanning six decades,” the group says of its journey to date. “With far-reaching capabilities from our four UK locations, we combine a rich heritage of marine engineering skills and experience to provide ship owners, governments and energy companies with all the precision skills needed to complete the most demanding projects. “Our success stems from our ongoing commitment to being the partner of choice to all of our customers,” continues A&P Group.
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“Our team of industry leading marine technicians has years of experience at the cutting edge of multi-discipline project delivery.” KEY RENEWABLE ROLE While much of A&P’s historic success has been based on its expertise in ship construction, it now finds itself one of the key contributors to the UK’s push for a greater reliance on offshore energy. “A&P has honed its specialist expertise in the renewable energy sector by servicing the UK’s expanding offshore wind industry,” the group explains, and its strategic locations in A&P Tyne, A&P Tees and A&P Great Yarmouth are ideally located to serve offshore wind projects in the North Sea such as East Anglia One, Hornsea and Dudgeon wind farms. With a highly-experienced project management team comprising architects, designers, fabricators and port operations specialists, large-scale fabrication capabilities and experience delivering technically challenging projects, “A&P is well placed to deliver a world-class service to the offshore
wind sector,” it surmises. Although less well-publicised than the likes of wind and solar, tidal energy is one of the oldest forms of energy generation, a renewable form that converts the natural rise and fall of the tides into electricity. Much more predictable than forecasting the appearance of wind and the sun, it has great potential for future electricity generation. Recognising the commercial need to constantly re-evaluate costs and so achieve lower energy costs, A&P Group works collaboratively with key players in this emerging sector. “A&P Group offers worldwide development management for tidal technology developers and works collaboratively with major renewable companies throughout the sector,” the group says of its role. “Well positioned on the South West and North East coasts, A&P Group has the facilities, expertise and marine heritage to push the boundaries of tidal development and manufacturing techniques, in order to lower costs without compromising quality.”
A&P FALMOUTH
FALMOUTH FACILITY Situated in the world’s third largest natural deep-water harbour, A&P Falmouth is tasked with synthesising the group’s famed marine, fabrication and engineering expertise, bringing together its specialist ancient art of ship repair with the new and growing need to harness the power of renewable energy. It is the largest ship-repair complex in the UK, with three large graving docks and extensive deep-water berthing
providing capacity for vessels up to 100,000 tonnes, and offers a complete range of marine repair services through on-site engineering, electrical, paint and fabrication workshops and historic relationships with specialist contractors and OEMs. Illustrative of A&P Falmouth’s full range cross-disciplinary capabilities came last year in the successful completion of leg extension and repairs on Fugro’s Excalibur Jack-Up vessel. An intensive two-month programme of work, at its end all eight of Excalibur’s legs had been repaired and upgraded, while two also required sections to be replaced and another pair received a 10-15 metre extension in length. The largest in the Fugro fleet of jack-up barges, it is capable of working in water depths up to 40 metres and has been used extensively
e // FALMOUTH IS o th t s ONE OF THE MOST r v ice e STRATEGICALLYor t S pp IMPORTANT SuPORTS IN THE UK //
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for installing foundations for offshore wind farm projects. “A&P were able to deliver to our high standards of detail and precision, which are vital for a works of this kind,” said Les Lugg, Fugro Director. “We have called on the team for Jack-Up mobilisation work in the past, providing support for mobilisations and demobilisation of our equipment as required, and their facilities and locality to our head office in Falmouth certainly adds value to our operations.”
trial ndus
Sectors
PERFECTLY POSITIONED A&P Falmouth’s location is particularly suited to jack-ups thanks to its large expanse of clear water, and this is just one of a long line of examples whereby A&P Falmouth’s prize location enables it to capitalise on high-profile, highvalue projects.
Support Services to the Marine & Industrial Sectors
EAPL provide an integrated approach to customers through the knowledge and experience of our multi-skilled management team. From small repairs to large project managed contracts, our multi skilled management team can offer advice to help rectify the situation, procure & supply materials and send one of our rapid response engineering teams to meet a vessel in order to effect repairs. We pride ourselves on providing a safe, responsive, reliable & reputable service at very competitive prices to the delight & satisfaction of all our clients.
www.eap-ltd.co.uk • enquiries@eap-ltd.co.uk • T: +44 (0)1634 827369
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INDUSTRY FOCUS: MARINE ENGINEERING
Of its placement, Drystan Jones, Port Operations Director, remarks that, “Falmouth is one of the most strategically important ports in the UK, at the head of the South Western approaches and with the natural advantage of safe anchorage in the estuary. “As a business, we have been able to build on the opportunities presented by our location, maximising the many opportunities to develop
// GLOBAL SHIP REPAIR, CONVERSION AND MARINE SPECIALIST A&P GROUP HAS A PROUD HISTORY OF QUALITYDRIVEN ENGINEERING AND MARINE EXCELLENCE //
Falmouth at Sunset © A&P Falmouth
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a thriving marine-tech business,” he underlines. “We are particularly wellsuited to jack up operations, including mobilisations for changes to blade racks and modifications. Around a hundred vessels come through the port each year.” Falmouth again came into its own in June, undertaking a four-week contract to provide offshore services to Stena Drilling’s Stena IceMAX. Another feather in the A&P cap, the Stena IceMAX is the world’s first dynamically positioned, dual mast ice-class drillship, and was anchored in Falmouth Bay for the duration of its stay. Falmouth Docks and Engineering Company (FDEC) oversaw the delivery of equipment and stores to the drillship’s undercover storage facility, as well as the transfer of those stores and the crews to the ship. “Stena Drilling needed a deep-water area where they could undertake crew changes and load stores prior to going to a job in southern Ireland,” explained
Jones. “We were delighted that they identified Falmouth as an ideal location to complete these works. “We provided a shore-base for Stena which included a through-store capability for bringing the equipment they needed for the vessel through our secure storage facility and the crew transfer operation. GOING NUCLEAR “A&P has been providing quality engineering services to the marine industry for over 155 years and has built up a highly skilled workforce over the last few decades,” Jones sums up of the group’s ability to adapt and diversify to the needs of the market, bringing it in line with the updated needs of the world today while retaining what it does best. “The company’s vision is to continue to build the core business supporting the global shipping and maritime, oil and gas industries, while continuing to diversify further into the civil defence, nuclear and
A&P FALMOUTH
Falmouth Docks © A&P Falmouth
// THE COMPANY’S VISION IS TO CONTINUE TO BUILD THE CORE BUSINESS SUPPORTING THE GLOBAL SHIPPING AND MARITIME, OIL AND GAS INDUSTRIES, WHILE CONTINUING TO DIVERSIFY FURTHER // renewable energy sectors, as well as exciting emerging areas such as autonomous vessels.” Just last month A&P Falmouth made major progress toward one of the key aspects of this vision, being granted Fit For Nuclear (F4N) status by
the Nuclear Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (Nuclear AMRC). It is an award given only to companies which have benchmarked their performance against the standards demanded by the nuclear industry’s top tiers. “Over the last two years A&P Falmouth has undergone a series of rigorous and challenging quality and cultural assessments, invested heavily in staff training and infrastructure and embedded Nuclear safety culture into every aspect of our ethos and operations,” said Steve Jones, Managing Director of Operations and Site Director at A&P Falmouth. “At A&P Falmouth,” added Dave Cook, Sector Lead for Nuclear at A&P Falmouth, “we have the skills, flexible workforce and experience to pursue these specialist fabrication projects, as well as the capacity and space required for projects of this scale. Plus, our large on-site machine shop also brings some new and unique skills
to the table which can be used to produce large turbine shafts, bearing shafts and turn-buckles to Quality Grade 1 specifications. There are few businesses as well placed as ours to pursue this market.” “As one of only a few companies in Cornwall to receive F4N recognition,” rounded off Steve Jones, “we are immensely proud of our achievement and it is testament to our team’s hard work, commitment and belief, that we have achieved this goal. Now we have the award the message is clear: A&P Falmouth is ready to work in the nuclear sector.”
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December 2019
EQUINOR
Third Largest NCS Field Starts Up ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
A&P Falmouth / DeRegt Cables / GeoSea / Borouge
AS FEAT UR ED IN
ENERGY FOCUS
DECEMBER 2019