Conference Day 1 | Tuesday, 25th August 2026
8:00 - 9:30
Registration and Welcome Coffee
9:00 - 9:10
Opening Remarks by IQPC and the Conference Chair
Ricardo Rocha -
Offshore Wind Technical Director,
BayWa r.e.
9:10 - 9:40
Closing the Gap: Offshore Wind Foundation Design Optimization Beyond Steel Tonnage
Andreas Willecke -
Director Offshore Wind Engineering,
Ramboll
• Real-world case studies from a designer’s perspective: Cost drivers beyond steel weight
• From wind farm layout and design drivers to cost of fabrication and design for installation
• Pairing holistic project development expertise with design decisions
• Closing the loop between project requirements, design assumptions, fabrication and installation reality
9:40 - 10:10
The Importance of Added Damping for Cost-efficient Offshore Wind Turbine Designs and Integrity
Martin Kirk Hoffmann -
Specialist, Global Support Structure Excellence,
Vestas
• Advanced WTG controller strategies for support structure load mitigation and stability
• Modular passive damper concept for various WTG stages throughout the lifecycle
10:10 - 10:40
The REDWIN Framework for Integrated Load Analysis: Principles, Industry Adoption, and Future Outlook
Ana Page -
Head of Section Computational Geomechanics,
Norwegian Geotechnical Institute
Nico Maljaars - Advisory Engineer Offshore Loads, Siemens Gamesa
* REDWIN Framework: Principles, validation against full scale offshore turbine data, and benefits for integrated load analysis
* Model implementation: Implementation in industry tools, e.g., integration into aero-elastic code BHawC by Siemens Gamesa
* Model performance: Fatigue and Extreme load reductions and related stiffness and damping behaviour based on experiments on several projects
* Future Outlook: Next steps towards Standardization, Industry adoption and Certification
10:40 - 11:10
From Requirements to Reality: Airtightness Specification and Sealing Options
Olivier Schuringa -
Design Engineer,
Trelleborg
* The airtightness requirement. What drives this specification and how does it evolve in time?
* Translation of airtightness requirements into design drivers and specifications, highlighting how functional requirements such as pressure retention, safety, and tolerance management are converted into practical sealing design criteria for offshore wind foundations.
* Recent industry solutions to achieve airtightness, showcasing modern sealing concepts and design approaches that respond to evolving installation methods, fabrication constraints, and cost and risk reduction targets.
* Real life engineering case studies, demonstrating how airtightness specifications and sealing solutions are applied and tested in practice.
11:10 - 11:40
Coffee Break and Networking
11:40 - 12:10
Advances in Fatigue Capacity of Offshore Wind Support Structures
Dr. Inge Lotsberg -
Specialist Engineer,
DNV Norway
* Latest research: revised S-N curve for butt welds, internal weld defects, thickness and size effects, weld‑improvement methods, updated SCFs for conical connections
* Effects of fabrication quality, early‑stage corrosion, and refined analytics on fatigue capacity
* Probabilistic approaches and relation to safety factors
* Outlook: Key challenges and opportunities for fatigue assessment in next‑generation offshore structures
12:10 - 12:40
Lifetime Extension of Offshore Wind Foundations: Data Driven Optimisation of Design Models
Thomas Krusenstjerna Albæk -
Head of Discipline - Primary Structures and Loads,
COWI A/S
• Integration of long term monitoring, inspection and hindcast datasets to establish an asis data foundation for lifetime extension assessment
• Development of data informed design envelope models capturing both typical and temporary extreme conditions
• Application of calibrated integrated load and soil–structure interaction analyses to reduce conservatism while maintaining structural and geotechnical integrity
• Demonstration of how targeted mitigation, inspection strategies and exposure control can enable safe extension of foundation lifetime beyond original design assumptions
12:40 - 13:10
Corrosion and Lifetime Extension - New fatigue concepts and lifetime extension through more precise fatigue curves.
Dr. Sulaiman Shojai -
Structural Engineer,
DLR, Institute of Maritime Energy Systems
• Use of current standard fatigue curves and their limitations with respect to environmental influences
• New corrosion-fatigue database and its significance for extending service life
• Use of notch stresses and the actual condition of components to assess remaining service life
13:10 - 14:30
Lunch Break and Networking
14:30 - 15:00
Damping assumptions for the load calculations process
Dr.-Ing. Marc Seidel -
Principal Engineer,
Siemens Gamesa
• Current challenges regarding damping assumptions in design processes
• Recommendations for damping values from different sources
• Damping validation
15:00 - 15:30
Design of damping in offshore wind structures
Lukas Schneider -
Chief Engineer,
ESM GmbH & Co. KG
• ESM GmbH in the wind industry: vibration specialist, product developer and supplier for damping solutions in onshore and offshore applications.
• Structural damping concepts and applications: TMDs for first and second mode vibrations during turbine operation and tower installation, including performance against VIV.
• Advanced and new damper developments for offshore towers, addressing increasing dynamic loads, reliability and cost efficiency.
• Extended offshore applications, including gearbox supports and couplings, as well as noise reduction in the sea caused by wind turbine operation.
15:30 - 16:00
RUNWAVE: Reduction of Uncertainties in WAVE Load Design for Bottom-Fixed Offshore Foundations Using a Probabilistic Approach
Niek Bruinsma -
Senior Researcher and Consultant Offshore Energy,
Delatres
Erik-Jan Ridder - Senior Project Manager, Maritime Research Institute Netherlands (MARIN)
• Probabilistic approach for wave loads
• Reduce uncertainties in design
• Optimize bottom-fixed foundations
• Lessons Learned and Application
16:00 - 16:30
Novel Installation Methods for Monopiles: From concept to prototype to offshore reality
Dr. Thomas Von Borstel -
Principal Engineer Offshore Wind Foundations,
Vattenfall Windkraft GmbH
Towards a Joint Industry Project for testing novel Monopile installation methods under realistic offshore conditions
Dr. Thomas Von Borstel
Principal Engineer Offshore Wind FoundationsVattenfall Windkraft GmbH
16:00 - 16:30
Optimizing Offshore Wind Operations: Cross Industry Lessons and Oil & Gas Insights for Reducing OpEx
Christopher Robinson -
Senior Engineer,
KENT ENERGIES UK LTD
Ahmed Abdelaah - Senior Foundations Engineer, Jera Nex
Operational efficiency is becoming an increasingly critical focus as offshore wind projects face rising cost pressures. In this roundtable, experts and participants will explore how proven monitoring and inspection approaches from the oil & gas sector can support smarter and more cost-effective operations in offshore wind. Drawing on cross industry experience, the discussion will highlight practical methods for reducing OpEx, improving reliability, and making better use of operational data.
16:00 - 16:30
Geotechnical Challenges and Opportunities in Offshore Wind
Ana Page -
Head of Section Computational Geomechanics,
Norwegian Geotechnical Institute
This roundtable focuses on key geotechnical issues across the offshore wind project lifecycle - from ground model development and concept selection through detailed design, installation, operation, life extension, and decommissioning. Discussion will highlight practical challenges, recent advances, and areas where further innovation is needed to reduce risk and costs.
16:00 - 16:30
Site Characterization Strategies for Floating Wind Developments/ Multi-Anchor Offshore Wind
Sjoerd De Wit -
Senior Geotechnical Engineer Offshore Wind,
Shell
Floating wind projects introduce unique geotechnical challenges due to their scale, evolving layouts, and predominantly lateral loading conditions. This roundtable will explore risk-based approaches to site investigations, discuss how traditional methods fall short, and share strategies for optimizing data collection in multi-anchor environments.
16:00 - 16:30
Understanding buckling in current and next generation (XXL) monopiles through numerical studies and optimization
Ömer Can Kücükyildiz -
Leading Specialist Offshore & Geoscience,
COWI A/S
This roundtable explores buckling in current and next generation (XXL) monopile foundations from a multidisciplinary perspective. We will discuss how geotechnical conditions, structural loads and fabrication imperfections interact in ways that remain conservative and/or insufficiently understood in current industry practice, limiting potential for optimization. The session will also highlight how improved numerical methods and FE simulations can support de-risking and more cost effective monopile design.
16:00 - 16:30
L-Flange Design - Complexity in value chain and conservatism of standards in L-Flange design.
Peter Mortensen -
Senior Specialist, Offshore Structures, Tower R&D,
Vestas Wind Systems A/s
Statement: Complexity and conservatism has reached a threshold, that leads to a significant cost-out for the industry implementing planned machining of structural flanges!
In this Roundtable two options are discussed.
1. Increased fatigue strength in the Bolts together with increased pre-load is used to cancel out the increased conservatism in the standards. Complexity in value chain remains.
2. Planned machining of large flanges have been proven to be a realistic solution. Approach will eliminate significant costly steps in the value chain. Simplicity rules.
What should the cost for planned machining of the flange target in order to be the selected solution?
16:30 - 17:00
Coffee Break and Networking
17:00 - 18:00
From Model-Based Reassessment to Governed, Data-Driven Lifetime Extension
Johan Toftekær -
Senior Engineer,
Vattenfall
Michael Sandholm Jepsen - Lead Engineer, Vattenfall
• Moving from one-off engineering reassessments to an operational, data-driven lifetime extension strategy
• Building a governed sensor-to-screen Digital Twin: from monitoring systems and data quality assurance to decision-ready LTE products
• Virtual sensing, using tower accelerations to reconstruct structural response and fatigue hotspots across entire wind farms
• Practical, real-world examples, including ship impact, scour development, and operational curtailment
• Data-driven decision-making in daily operations and lifetime extension assessments
• Open discussion on data availability, transparency, data sharing, and pathways toward future research, codes, and standards
This deep dive presents Vattenfall’s transition from traditional, model-based lifetime reassessment toward a governed, fully data-driven approach to lifetime extension in offshore wind. Rather than treating monitoring and analysis as isolated exercises, the session demonstrates how a complete sensor-to-screen Digital Twin can be made operational at scale — linking monitoring systems, data quality control, structural modelling, virtual sensing, and LTE products into a single, transparent workflow.
Through concrete case examples from operating wind farms, participants will see how measured data is transformed into structural loads, fatigue damage, and integrity indicators that directly support data-driven operational and lifetime extension decisions. Particular, emphasis is placed on governance: how traceability, validation strategies, and clearly defined outputs are essential for trust, repeatability, and regulatory acceptance.
The session also opens a broader discussion on data sharing and collaboration. By making high-quality operational data available for research and joint initiatives, the industry can accelerate learning, improve methods, and support the development of future guidelines, codes, and standards. The format combines short technical walkthroughs with interactive discussion, inviting participants to reflect on their own data readiness, organizational challenges, and opportunities to move from promising concepts to practical, standardizable solutions.
