Techouse tests offshore steam generator targeting 25% CO2 cuts

At Sustainable Energy’s test center in Stord, western Norway, a full-scale steam generator has spent its latest trial being shaken, loaded and thermally stressed. Techouse says the compact once-through steam generator, or COTSG, completed performance, vibration, fatigue and thermal-fatigue testing designed to examine whether it can survive offshore service.

The engineering problem begins with wasted heat. Gas turbines on offshore installations generate electricity and heat, then release hot exhaust. A combined-cycle system captures that exhaust to produce steam; the steam drives a separate turbine connected to a generator, creating additional electricity without an equivalent increase in fuel consumption. On land, the approach is established. Offshore, conventional heat-recovery equipment can be too large and heavy for limited deck space and structural capacity, with floating FPSOs facing extra constraints.

Techouse says its compact design could cut fuel consumption and CO2 emissions by up to 25% compared with conventional gas-turbine generation. The company’s earlier estimates suggested annual reductions of 50,000 to 150,000 metric tons of CO2 for floating and fixed installations, but those numbers are estimates rather than results from the latest testing campaign.

So what changes in practice? If the generator reaches deployment, offshore operators could recover more of the energy already leaving their gas turbines while fitting the equipment into tighter, weight-constrained sites. That could apply to fixed production platforms, FPSOs and other offshore installations that rely heavily on gas-turbine power generation. The immediate benefit is more electricity from existing waste heat.

The test campaign also included cyclic loading intended to assess a targeted 30-year operating life. Techouse says the results were positive against its key parameters, but it is still analyzing the data, and the milestone does not yet prove readiness for widespread commercial deployment. Techouse is targeting a commercial launch by the end of 2026 and says it will also explore combining the technology with offshore carbon-capture systems.