WEDUSEA wave energy project makes design and engineering progress

The partners in the €19.6 million WEDUSEA wave energy project have made significant progress in the engineering and design scope of development, building on learnings from previous wave energy initiatives.

All the design elements are currently in the process of being finalized by the project partners, with progress being made across all tasks in WEDUSEA’s Front End Engineering Design and Procurement work package.

Short for ‘Wave Energy Demonstration at Utility Scale to Enable Arrays’, the WEDUSEA project will demonstrate OceanEnergy’s grid-connected 1MW floating wave energy converter OE35 at the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) test site in Scotland.

Being developed by 14 international partners, the project is ultimately expected to create a technology deployment pathway for a 20MW pilot farm by achieving a significant decrease in the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) for wave energy industry.

So far, Advanced Simulation Technologies, one of the project partners, has completed the optimized design of the Wells turbine and an air flow control system consisting of valves is currently being developed to prevent the turbine from stalling.

ABL Group’s Longitude Engineering has redesigned the hull to incorporate the turbine design, with the potential for an overall weight saving.

As part of the work package, the Fraunhofer Institute for Energy Economics and Energy System Technology (IEE) has progressed with the design of the power take-off (PTO) system, while the University College Cork scoped the sensors required for the data acquisition system including those required for environmental monitoring.

The design of moorings is ongoing and INNOSEA has developed a model specific to the OE35 at the EMEC site, while OceanEnergy completed tank testing for the project at the Lir National Ocean Test Facility (Lir NOTF) in Ireland.

The device was tested using wave states that are expected at the EMEC site, the project partners said.

The successful demonstration of the OE35 in the WEDUSEA project is expected to pave the way for future deployment of multiple devices in an array to form a wave energy farm.

This will be the stepping stone to full commercial roll out for significant power station developments, which are in line with the future targets of the European Commission’s Offshore Renewable Energy Strategy of 1GW of ocean energy by 2030.

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