Our Taiwan offshore wind inspection season is complete, and this week two of our team have been in Taipei for Net-Zero Taiwan and Energy Taiwan at TaiNEX 1, which runs from 14 to 16 October 2026.
Our Taiwan offshore wind inspection season
The campaign covered foundation and cable protection system inspection across an offshore wind farm in the Taiwan Strait. The team worked from crew transfer vessels, with three-hour transits each way and departures at three in the morning, against a current that runs round the island day and night.
Typhoons closed the site for days at a time and left a week of poor visibility behind each one, and fishing gear around the structures added to the work. The scope was delivered close to the programme agreed at the start, with a daily report to the client every evening.
Part way through the season, underwater photogrammetry was mobilised at short notice to look at cable protection system issues. The kit was shipped as a single pallet by air cargo, and the dataset was processed remotely.
What offshore wind farm inspection involves
Most of the work on an offshore wind farm sits below the waterline, where the foundations and cables are. A typical ROV inspection looks at the condition of each foundation, the level of marine growth, cathodic protection readings that show whether the corrosion protection is working, and the seabed around the base, where scour can undermine the structure over time.
Cable protection systems need particular attention. They protect the export and array cables where they leave the seabed and run up into the foundation, and that is where movement, abrasion and damage tend to appear first. Finding a problem there early is far cheaper than repairing a failed cable later.
Running that work from crew transfer vessels keeps the spread small. Compact ROV systems can be mobilised quickly and carried on a standard crew transfer vessel, which keeps vessel time down for operators and contractors.
A week at Energy Taiwan
With the season closed out, our Head of Sales, Dave Underwood, and Project Manager, Pete Measures, stayed on for Net-Zero Taiwan and Energy Taiwan. The two shows run side by side at TaiNEX 1, and Energy Taiwan includes Wind Energy Taiwan, which brings together the developers, contractors and suppliers working on the country’s wind power build-out.
Offshore wind development in Taiwan
The Taiwan offshore wind market is still growing. The country has close to 5 GW of offshore wind in operation. On installed capacity, the government’s plan for 2026 to 2039, published in July, sets a target of 18.3 to 19.9 GW by 2035 and up to 27.9 GW by 2039, according to reporting by the Taipei Times on the Ministry of Economic Affairs road map. Several of the newer projects sell their output through long-term corporate power purchase agreements rather than a fixed government tariff.
For inspection, that growth is long term. Every new wind farm in Taiwan brings more wind turbines, foundations, cables and scour protection that will need inspecting throughout their working lives, often in the same conditions our team worked in this season: strong currents, early starts, long transits and weather that can shut a site for days.
Why we make the effort to be there
We work all over the world, so understanding the culture of each place we work is very important to us: how decisions get made, how relationships are built, and what clients expect from a partner. Working closely with experts in the region is a big part of how we have delivered successful projects overseas, and it is why we make the effort to be there in person.
You can read more about our work across offshore renewables, including the inspection services we run on offshore wind farms in the UK and overseas.
If you are planning Taiwan offshore wind inspection scopes, or work elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific region for 2027, the team would be glad to talk.
Contact Information
For more information about Atlantas Marine, get in touch through our contact page or email info@atlantasmarine.com.