The overarching objective of this Task is to accelerate the development and deployment of ocean energy technology through a multi-country exchange of available ocean project information and experience to allow the participants to understand the current state of knowledge in the field, and to develop a consistent method of assessing the performance and cost of ocean energy conversion systems.
The primary focus of these efforts will be to develop an assessment of the fundamental knowledge in the following four topical areas of direct interest to the ocean energy community:
- Methods for estimating and verifying the ocean energy resources and characteristics, including instrumentation types and deployment methods to capture resource data;
- Methods for modeling the interaction of ocean energy devices with the resource and verifying the results;
- Methods for modeling and experimentally verifying energy capture, power system efficiency, and the resulting loads including extreme loads, from the interaction of the device and the resource;
- Methods for estimating and validating the cost and performance for ocean energy device arrays, including component, subsystem, and the electrical cable and supporting installation, operation, and maintenance, to enable assessment of the total cost of electricity.
The challenges of assessing the broad ocean energy knowledge base and the modeling and testing capabilities for ocean energy conversion devices are significant. The success of this effort relies on a thorough understanding of the resource characteristics, the fluid-device interaction, and the mechanical conversion of the captured energy to electricity. These challenges are certainly difficult for the device designer, but are many times more difficult for government agencies and potential private investors as they attempt to compare and contrast one device to another, both to project the role that ocean energy may assume in their portfolios and to choose from among the designs for the best alternative for a particular site.The products of this Task aims to provide a basis for selection and investment in the most promising technologies and device designs.
Workshops organised under Task 5 aim to facilitate the presentation of publically funded project information including: designs methods, modeling methods and results, experimental designs and testing results, specific costing studies, and environmental studies and experiments. Generally, any publically funded ocean energy project should be considered for presentation at one of the workshops. The resulting information will be included in the assessment of the knowledge base for ocean energy.
Each workshop is documented by a report that contains the workshop presentations, a summary of the discussions, and any resulting conclusions.
Since 2012, Task 5 has conducted three exchange workshops, in which participating members presented, collected, and reviewed project information, experience, and data. Task 5 has facilitated the presentation of projects from participating member countries in the areas of open ocean testing methods and test center operation as well as the verification and validation of computational modeling methods:
- WORKSHOP I: OPEN WATER TESTING
Dublin, Ireland, October 2012
The open water testing workshop brought together test site operators and wave device developers to exchange information and experience on all aspects of planning, development, operation, and usage of open-water test facilities to identify possible improvements in the capabilities of these facilities for the mutual benefit of the entire ocean energy industry.
Workshop participants included 36 representatives from 12 different countries. The participants gave 16 presentations about open-water test facilities.
During workshop discussion sessions, a central theme emerged that focused on defining a business model for test centers in order for them to most effectively accelerate the development and commercialization of the industry. A second issue that emerged during the workshop was the clear preference of device developers to perform research and development (R&D) testing in open waters at or near full scale to validate stepwise device improvements and environmental effects over extended periods of time. A third issue that emerged was whether the test centers should provide some type of certificate attesting to the type and duration of testing that was accomplished during the open-water deployment of a device.
Results are available at the final report of the workshop.
- WORKSHOP II: COMPUTATIONAL MODELING AND ANALYSIS
Edinburgh, Scotland, November 2013
There are numerous worldwide organizations and individuals developing and applying computational analysis methods to analyze the performance and dynamic loading of wave, tidal, and ocean current devices. The goal of Workshop II was to bring together these expert analysts to exchange information and experience on all aspects of developing, using, verifying and validating these computational modeling tools to improve these capabilities for the mutual benefit of the global ocean energy industry.
Fifty participants from 12 different countries attended the two-day workshop. Twenty-seven presentations were given, 14 on the analysis and design of tidal and current converters, and 13 presentations on wave energy converter analysis and design. Workshop participants concluded that using computational benchmarking to rigorously validate wave and tidal codes for marine energy applications would be extremely useful for the global marine energy community.
Results are available at the Final Report of the workshop.
- WORKSHOP III: DESIGNING FOR RELIABILITY OF WAVE AND CURRENT MARINE ENERGY CONVERTERS
Lisbon, Portugal, 5-6 February 2015
The goal of this workshop was to allow marine energy converter (MEC) designers to exchange information and share knowledge on device analysis and design methods for ensuring survivability, structural integrity, and fully operational power generation between scheduled maintenance events. The workshop sponsors invited presentations from the international MEC community on the following reliability related topics:
- Example applications of design methods for reliability and survivability for MECs
- Risk management and technical risk assessment techniques and methods applied to MECs
- Methods and example applications of failure modes and effects analysis applied to MECs to enhance maintainability, reliability, and survivability
- Design guidance and procedures for maintainability, repair avoidance, maintenance cycle extension, maintenance scheduling, and unscheduled maintenance event reduction.
- Example sets of design load cases and methods to design for survival under high load operating and extreme environmental conditions
- Designing for fatigue under both operating conditions and extreme environmental conditions
- Methods for assessing natural frequencies and modal response under operating and extreme conditions
- Guidance and example applications of corrosion prevention, including material selection, coatings, cathodic protection, and active corrosion prevention systems
- Biological interaction control and prevention to increase reliability and survivability
- Safety factors selection for high reliability under operational and survival conditions
- Preventative maintenance strategies and methods.
The workshop was attended by a total of 22 participants from 7 different countries. Over the 2 day workshop, there were 13 presentations given on research into the reliability of ocean energy converters.
The final report of this workshop is available here
- WORKSHOP IV: OCEAN ENERGY POLICIES: LESSONS LEARNT
Smogen, Sweden, 12 May 2016
The objective of this workshop was to review and discuss the lessons learnt from various existing ocean energy policies and other support measures that have been implemented in OES member countries. Through knowledge sharing and collaborative analysis of impacts on the ocean energy sector, it is intended that lessons may be learnt from the results of these instruments, allowing future policies and support measures to be designed in a more effective manner.
The ultimate aim of this workshop was to identify ways in which policy instruments may be used to accelerate development of the ocean energy sector. Central to this goal is the need to foster significant reductions in the cost of ocean energy. This implies that improvements in the affordability, performance, availability and survivability of marine energy technology will be required in order to effectively reduce cost. The invited presentations comprising this workshop are to identify and analyze previously implemented ocean policies and support measure.
The final report of this workshop is available here.
