ERM's Dolphyn project has been awarded the prestigious Grand Prix winner (overarching winner of all categories) in The Engineer Magazine’s 2020 Collaborate To Innovate (C2I) Awards. Winning in its category for Energy and Environment, ERM’s Dolphyn project then went forward against winners in another 8 categories to be voted overall winner.

Now in its fifth year, The Engineer’s C2I was established to uncover and celebrate great examples of technology-led engineering collaboration across a range of different disciplines and sectors.

ERM’s Dolphyn (Deepwater Offshore Local Production of HYdrogeN) project, a first of its kind, is an innovative integrated system combining all of the technologies required to bring the latest floating wind and hydrogen production technologies together.

Commenting on the award, Project director and ERM partner Kevin Kinsella said “While we are still at the early stages of recognizing the full potential of this technology in its contribution to the transition to low carbon sources of energy, this award is fantastic recognition of the progress made by the team at ERM and our project contributors and advisors.”

The ERM team has been supported by Offshore Design Engineering (ODE), Tractebel Engie, Principle Power Inc (PPI), NEL, Doosan and Lloyds Register. The project was awarded £3.12m from the UK Government in February 2020 for further development and is currently reviewing options for the next phase of development.

Kevin Kinsella continued “Everyone working on the project is excited and aware of the enormous potential that the technology has to produce green hydrogen at scale from the outstanding offshore wind resource that is available in the North Sea and other UK deepwater locations. This technology will ultimately have uses globally in areas with good offshore wind.”

ERM has accelerated the development plan for the project, and is now working towards an operational start-up in 2024/25 for a 10MW full scale pre-commercial facility with potential follow on projects over the next few years.