Denmark-based wind farm development company Ørsted has launched an immersive safety training programme in the UK.
The company purpose-built a facility in the Humberside region of the UK for $1.9m (£1.4m). Ørsted partnered with immersive training company Active Training Team (ATT), which designed the facility and the ‘Thrive’ programme.
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By GlobalDataImmersive training involves workers in role-play, using actors to simulate practical situations on a worksite.
ATT co-director Dermot Kerrigan told Power Technology: “It’s a multi-set, multi-media theatre experience in which participants experience a fatal incident at a wind industry dockside. By then being taken through a variety of immersive sets the attendees come to an understanding of the organisational and cultural antecedents that led to the incident as well as its consequences.”
The company originally designed the sessions to accommodate 39 trainees. However, Covid-19 restrictions have limited sessions to 18 trainees per day and the company continues to review this number.
Ørsted will train all workers for the upcoming Hornsea Two offshore wind farm project at the facility. The project involves the construction of 165 turbines, 89km off the coast of the UK.
Ørsted see training facility as ‘legacy’ of development
Senior construction project manager for Hornsea Two and project manager for development of the Thrive facility Jason Ledden said: “Safety is a core value and as such, it has been extremely difficult to postpone the roll-out of this pivotal training. We’ve reduced numbers and introduced safety measures to ensure that our programme is fully compliant with government guidelines under these difficult circumstances.
“We hope that other industries across the Humber will utilise this new exciting resource which aims to bring about behavioural changes in attitudes towards safety.”
ATT’s Kerrigan continued: “As well as the wind power version of the programme, for use by Ørsted’s Hornsea Two and other clients in the renewables sector, we also look forward to hosting bespoke versions of the programme for a variety of industries in the region – and beyond.”
The Thrive scheme will remain available to other companies and sectors after its completion, with the ability to custom-make different training scenarios. The CEO of Associated British Ports has already committed his company to using the scheme.
ATT said Thrive draws on techniques similar to those used by the Thames Tideway project, a sewer construction scheme in London. So far, the project has not had any lost-time injuries in its four years of construction.
