Team Finance and Fastblade

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FASTBLADE started in 2016 when Conchúr Ó Brádaigh (Head of School of Engineering) secured £1.8 million from the EPSRC to develop the world's first tidal turbine test facility. Two years after the conceptual design, the University committed to deliver a future proof facility capable of testing the larger turbine blades of tomorrow. Finance, procurement and legal helped develop a robust business case for the facility.

What is Fastblade?

The Fastblade project puts the University of Eidnburgh at the forefront of wave energy, which could be the next generation of green electricity. By placing large turbines on the sea bed,  the motion of the waves can be converted into electricity. Whilst they are underwater, the blades of these turbines are subjected to incredible forces. The Fastblade project will test prototype turbine blades in a purpose built test rig. The project will then advise turbine manufacturers how to modify the design of the turbine blade. In a collaboration with local industry, the test rig is under construction at the Babcock naval shipyard in Rosyth.

The University's School of Engineering will benefit from Babcock’s experience of operating complex pieces of machinery in the seawater around Scotland. Babcock will benefit from access to the School of Engineering, their knowledge of new composite materials and latest technologies. Fastblade is a physically huge undertaking. The shed which Babcock has provided is 40 metres long, and 19 metres wide. It needs to be this size to enable the hydraulic test jig to be built. It will be able to test turbine blades up to 20 metres long.

Through the external advisory board, FASTBLADE is designed ‘with industry for industry’. FASTBLADE demonstrates the University’s commitment to combatting climate change through renewable energy research and development, and the Procurement team has ensured the facility also helps with sustainable procurement and ensuring community benefits. The project team are working with Babcock and Fife College on providing training and development for apprentices.

Placements for students

Between placements, interns and postgrad projects, there will be 9 students involved in Fastblade on a full time basis. In addition, around 130 students will benefit from a module about “Engineers working in Industry” taught by the project lead.

 This project is very unusual. This meant that the Finance team working on it really had to think outside the box in order to deliver the best support to the school which had requested our assistance. The team enjoyed working together, and found innovating new solutions for our customer to be very rewarding.

Christian Davis, Finance Business Partner, University of Edinburgh

University-wide collaboration

The partnership with Babcock International Group to deliver this world’s first facility has required unique solutions to mitigate commercial and technical risks. Procurement, estates and legal teams have helped with everything from developing specifications, sourcing components, reviewing proposals and risk mitigation and management at a project level to ensure compliance and successful delivery. Building a world’s first facility on a leased property out-with the current campus with sound mitigations for technical and commercial risks has been a mammoth task. Through perseverance we now have a new industrial partner, Babcock, and the start of a new campus.

The support and guidance of procurement, estates, legal and Edinburgh Innovations to mitigate risks and develop the facility has been invaluable in overcoming the unique challenges of this world’s first facility. Clear communication, transparency and trust are the values that we shared, and this has underpinned FASTBLADE’s delivery so far.

This project is a good example of the benefits of having a range of experts in different fields contributing to this process; it’s  an example of several specialist experts within Finance working together to help a UoE school to achieve its strategy goal. The Insurance team had to innovate new products to reflect the complexity of the asset and the activity which required cover. The tax team had to use their professional expertise to determine the appropriate tax treatment for an unusual new activity for which there were few precedents to refer back to. Finance worked closely with Estates (who managed the relationship with the landowner) and Legal (who drew up contracts for this unusual collaboration).

Supporting our mission

The project helps with two major University goals:

-Environmental sustainability: The project is aligned to generating power from waves by installing “windmills under the sea”. The test rig at Rosyth is designed to test blades of the windmills to see how they stretch and twist under the various forces of the sea water..  Meeting the UN Sustainability goals. This is green electricity, and UoE is in a world leading role in this industry

- Industrial Collaboration: This project is a close link between UoE and local industry, it is hoped that it will lead onto similar collaborations in future.  , and will lead to the Babcock’s shipyard working closer with Engineering and UoE in general. In addition, Babcock’s will employ 2 apprentices to work full time on this new activity.