Our Aura CDT students took part in a two-day residential on 11 & 12 June 2024, hosted by Newcastle University, with support from their Dove Marine Laboratory, research vessel Princess Royal and Blyth Marine Station on the Northumberland coast and Equinor – a global leader in offshore wind. The residential brought together students and academics from the Aura CDT’s four partner universities – Durham, Hull, Newcastle and Sheffield.

On day one, our students took part in a Hackathon, where they worked in cross-cohort and cross-disciplinary teams to find solutions to environmental challenges. The teams took part in a Dragon’s Den style pitching exercise to select the winning idea. Our winning team comprised Akash Kumar, Enora Lecordier, Callum Rothon, Reuben Tinsdeall, Sarah-Jane Tonks, who set out an innovative plan to incorporate UV coatings into turbine blades to reduce insect mortality.

Winning team member, Callum Rothon said:

“Working together in the Hackathon task was a great chance to practice agile problem solving, working quickly and effectively in a team.”

Prof Pete Osborne, Professor of Advanced Manufacturing at the University of Sheffield said:

“The whole point of CDTs is that they bring together a group of researchers to solve big challenging problems. Events like this residential are therefore vital in terms of facilitating that but also by creating a sense of community which brings about appreciation of everyone’s perspective and understanding.”

On day two, the students enjoyed another a packed programme, including a visit to Newcastle University’s Emerson Cavitation Tunnel – a specialist flume for hydrodynamic research including turbines, blade coatings and other innovations. The students also undertook training in scientific writing techniques, facilitated by staff from Newcastle Academic Skills Team, they had a boat trip on the RV Princess Royal to get a rare, close-up view offshore turbines in action, and also visited Equinor.

Many thanks to Tom Nightingale, UK Supply Chain Leader in Renewables at Equinor, who hosted the CDT’s tour of the company’s Dogger Bank Operations and Maintenance base. Our students were able to speak to team members in the control room and gain an insight into windfarm construction. Once completed, Dogger Bank Wind Farm in the North Sea will comprise 277 turbines, powering six million British homes.

Our Cohort 4 student, Geng Chen (Sam) said:

“The residential was invaluable, offering insights into environmental and engineering research while providing first-hand experience of the offshore environment. Standing beneath the turbine was a powerful reminder of the extraordinary engineering we are engaged in and a source of great pride.”

We are also grateful to Professor Per Berggren of Newcastle University for his work in setting up the residential, as well as Cohort 2 student, Sarah Dickson, who helped to prepare the interactive exercises.

Cohort 2 student, Sarah Bee summed up the value of the residential to inspire our students with hands-on offshore wind industry experience when she said:

“The Aura CDT residential was expertly compiled to provide a mixture of offshore wind site-seeing and collaboration. For me, a highlight was the trip to the Equinor O&M base for the Doggerbank wind farm projects. Getting a glimpse of the construction process was an inspiring end to a great couple of days.”

The annual CDT residential is part of our continuing professional development (CPD) programme, which complements the initial CDT taught programme with further opportunities to work with fellow students and industry partners, supporting our students to become future leaders of the offshore wind industry.