The Netherlands: Bureau Veritas Developing Offshore Wind Farm Certification

On the second day of the Offshore Energy Exhibition and Conference held in Amsterdam RAI, one of our reporters made an exclusive interview with the Director Industry of Bureau Veritas Mr. Yvo Jansen. Hereby we are bringing you a part of their conversation.

– What is the process behind acquiring a regulatory certificate in the marine industry?

We have various certification processes for instance the classification of ships, that is one part, that is being done by our marine surveyors, and next to that we are certifying various products and complete projects; for example offshore wind farms. We can certify all the products, components inclusive of the total contracting installation of the offshore wind farm including the global supply chain network for shop inspections and/or supplier technical assessments. So there are three significant areas of value added service, we have the testing, inspection/verification and certification (TIC) of the entire project scope.

We also do that for instance for an offshore platform. So we certify on behalf of the Dutch government and the regulatory body, and we certify together with the end user and at the end of the certification process after the build, and through commissioning and start-up at which point licence to operate (LTO) is completed.

And with that licence to operate companies can rest assured that their operations will produce safely and without business interruptions.

– Are you considering of venturing into new business segments besides the eight global businesses already existent?

Our focus remains on core business activities, which is again testing, inspection and certification (TIC), year on year double digit growth has been achieved based on this simple model. Our eight global businesses perform extremely well. Our main focus currently besides adding value for the shareholders in the long term, is currently looking very much at the growth where you are looking at the growth market established by acquisitions. We have lots of organic growth in the onshore, downstream business, that’s an important part because we are from offshore, the red environments and currently we also are getting a strong position within work involved from the onshore part, that is one important part, so that means power plans, refineries, total projects, next is again especially looking at the North Sea, Norway and Denmark, also the UK, even more penetrating the offshore markets. That means not only by certifying the total new-built platforms and FPSOs but also servicing the clients during the operations. That means we will keep our certificates of compliance and do all the inspections during the lifetime of the platform. And we are managing that from Aberdeen, Esbjerg, Copenhagen, Amersfoort and Rotterdam, so that is the second important growth.

The third important growth is cross-selling internally, because all our business units look on client’s focus, somehow we forgot in the past by the growth to also take care of our existing portfolio to see if we can offer more. That is the third way to go to business.

– Are you planning to offer new services to your customers in the near future?

The nature of our business is to ensure that we offer the customer the range of services required to secure their LTO as we all know nothing stays the same forever! The near future will of course service supporting this new growth. One of the new firm’s services we are currently developing is to have this offshore wind farm certification. That means currently we can perform type testing for the wind turbines, inspections and testing for the big blades, and of course after the installation, we can do a total projects renewable wind farm certification.

With the successful development of offshore wind farm services Bureau Veritas is well positioned to fulfil the requirement of owner operators and manufacturer. Also in future we will move forward with confidence.

– What sort of training do your employees go through to better understand your Code of Ethics?

Our Group has built a successful global business based upon its long-standing reputation. This reputation is one of the most valuable assets for the Group worldwide and is reflected in our core and business values.

These values, shared by everyone and to which each of us subscribes, are the major unifying factors of Bureau Veritas. They reinforce our unity and cohesion and help promote our strategy of profitable growth.

Our core values “Integrity and Ethics” and “Impartiality and Independence” were the focal point of the work carried out by our profession under the leadership of the International Federation of Inspection Agencies (IFIA).

Our deployment of the Code of Ethics is embedded truly in our organisation with an extensive implementation programme to ensure that every employee has read and understood the Code of Ethics; that every manager is also familiar with the Code of Ethics Internal Policies and Procedures; and that Bureau Veritas has in place and is able to demonstrate that it has in place, an effective Compliance Programme.

Today, the Bureau Veritas Code of Ethics is available in 20 languages and the learning module is available in 10 languages, covering over 54,000+ employees.

– Are you satisfied with your company’s success in this year so far?

Yes, we are absolutely satisfied, in fact we are exceeding again our expectations and we have done that for quite a number of years. Again this year was no surprise but I am very happy to say we are on track with our 2015 plan. Successfully building on our core business, our employees and our client base. Exceeding our expectations means that our employees have a lot of passion, commitment and motivation to continue to grow the business.

– What has been your most important project in this year?

One of the important projects is that we are doing three parallel total certifications, starting from design review, check of the design, up to the installation and commissioning of three platforms and pipelines. This is a top client, a top priority project for us and we will seek to continue to service our clients but in this time we have three platforms we have to manage. These platforms are not only designed but also fabricated in different locations, so we are challenging our engineers and board of managers to deliver this project in time and it will be, from now, delivery next year.

[mappress]

Offshore WIND staff, November 12, 2012