Ossian Offshore Wind Farm, located off the coast of Scotland, will be one of the largest floating wind farms globally once developed
In 2024, we provided a work winning team to support our client to bid for the contract to deliver the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Development Consent Order (DCO) for the onshore infrastructure of Ossian Offshore Wind Farm.
The opportunity
Once developed, the Ossian Offshore Wind Farm will generate up to 3.6 GW of renewable energy, which is enough to power up to 6 million homes annually. This will contribute to net zero targets by offsetting up to 7.5 million tonnes of carbon emissions every year.
SSE Renewables (SSER), Marubeni Corporation and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) were looking for a partner to deliver the EIA and DCO for the onshore infrastructure associated with Ossian Offshore Wind Farm, and to manage the associated stakeholder engagement. This is a complex and technical project that represents significant progress towards the UK’s aim to increase offshore wind capacity from 13.7 GW to 50 GW by 2030.
EiB approach and involvement
A Scotland team for a Scotland project
With our base in central Edinburgh, we provided local support for the client. We worked closely with our client’s bid director to develop the strategy, while developing the responses and over 20 CVs to meet SSER’s requirements and produce a high quality tender submission. We worked collaboratively to ensure a consistent tone of voice across all responses. These spanned our proposed methodology, organogram, resourcing, relevant experience, health and safety, quality and the environment.
Developing a strategy for unusual quality questions
The quality questions in the tender exercise were very short. In some cases, we had the challenge of producing a detailed response to a simple closed question such as “Please confirm you will comply with…”. Therefore, we had to use our knowledge and skills in bidding to determine what the end client really wanted to know and plan comprehensive answers to short, closed questions. We developed a strategy with our client, mapping out which topics to address in each response to meet the expectations of SSER and partners while showcasing our solution as effectively as possible. We facilitated storyboard sessions with the client to answer plan the detail of each response, working closely with subject matter experts to align with the client’s scope of work document.
Focusing on innovation and added value
The tender emphasised the requirement for innovation and added value, so throughout the bid life cycle we challenged our client to reflect on how it had taken an innovative approach to similar projects and to identify how it could add value when delivering this project. We capitalised on our client’s impressive track record in EIA and DCO consenting to instil confidence in its ability to deliver the contract with expertise, innovation and added value.
Success and outcomes
We supported our client to produce a compliant and compelling tender submission for the EIA and DCO consenting of the onshore infrastructure of Ossian Offshore Wind Farm. Since its formation in June 2022, our Scotland team has built strong working relationships and a collaborative culture having delivered bids across the highways, rail, facilities management and energy sectors. This opportunity enabled us to further build on these relationships to constructively challenge and review one another’s responses, driving a high-quality submission for our client.