Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Programme 2014 - 2020 INTERREG VB Atlantic Area

Description

Description (EN):

Marine renewable energy from tides is a significant potential growth industry for the Atlantic Area. There is a barrier to growth due to uncertainty in the engineering design, resulting in technology that is too expensive and risky to attract financial investment. The MONITOR project aims to foster the growth of the tidal energy sector. It will investigate the forces acting on the blades and structures of Tidal Energy Converters (TEC) and their impact on reliability. This investigation will be carried out in an iterative fashion and will incorporate simulations, laboratory tests and testing at sea. The impact of the project will be better quantification of technical risk to TEC developers and more robust TEC designs, which will allow lower engineering safety factors, thus lowering cost while also improving reliability. The partners will identify critical parameters for the blades and support structure, allowing to design a monitoring system for the specific devices used in the investigation. This system will de-risk TEC development, improve reliability and thereby increase capacity factor (i.e., power generated as a proportion of theoretical capacity) and lower capital expenditure/ operating expenditure. This is a crucial challenge for the sector, and overcoming it will reduce risk, thus demonstrating TEC feasibility to investors and public bodies.

Achievements (EN):

Marine renewable energy from tides is a significant potential growth industry for the Atlantic Area. But there is a barrier to growth due to uncertainty around device reliability, resulting in tidal energy converter (TEC) technology that is too expensive and risky to attract financial investment. MONITOR’s goal was to investigate the forces acting on TEC blades and structures, to help TEC developers improve device reliability and thereby encourage the growth of the tidal energy sector. The project identified critical parameters for the blades and support structure to design a monitoring system for two specific TEC devices (Magallanes’ ATIR and Sabella’s D10) and develop a generalised monitoring system that can be applied to any TEC. This data was supplemented with an extended programme of laboratory-scale tests and numerical simulations at several levels of fidelity. MONITOR thereby sought to combine the ‘gold standard’ of measurements on real full-scale devices at sea with the greater control possible in lab and computational models. From these multi-model sources of technical data, a general reliability model of TECs using variation mode and effects analysis (VMEA) was developed. As a new-to-the-market product that increases certainty regarding blade/structure reliability, the VMEA model will accelerate Blue Growth. It is applicable to any TEC design, to de-risk TEC development, improve reliability and increase capacity factor (i.e. power generated as a proportion of theoretical capacity), and lower capital and operating expenditure. The outputs of this reliability tool are used in conjunction with technoeconomic modelling to predict the impact of reliability improvements on the cost of tidal energy: this is fundamentally the most important output of the project and it will have the strongest long-term impact on the development of the tidal energy sector in the Atlantic Area. "Our work during the project has highlighted the common challenges that are faced by all tidal stream devices in achieving an commercially viable standard of reliability, and the effect this has on their ability to generate renewable energy economically. We hope that the work of MONITOR will be useful to everyone in tidal stream energy who is looking to improve the reliability of their devices.” Michael Togneri MONITOR project lead.

Themes

Renewable energy

Specific Objective: Fostering renewable energies and energy efficiency

Thematic Objective: (04) supporting the shift towards a low-carbon economy in all sectors by:

Investment Priority: (04a) promoting the production and distribution of energy derived from renewable sources

Partners

Lead Partner: Swansea University

Address: Swansea, United Kingdom

Legal status: public

Total budget: EUR 524 120.00

ERDF budget: EUR 393 090.00

Coláiste na hOllscoile Corcaigh

Name: Coláiste na hOllscoile Corcaigh

Address: Cork, Ireland

Legal status: public

Total budget: EUR 126 659.00

ERDF budget: EUR 94 994.25

European Marine Energy Centre

Name: European Marine Energy Centre

Address: Orkney, United Kingdom

Legal status: private

Total budget: EUR 190 859.00

ERDF budget: EUR 143 144.25

CRIA-Divisao de Emprendedorismo e Transferenecia de Tecnología

Name: CRIA-Divisao de Emprendedorismo e Transferenecia de Tecnología

Address: Faro, Portugal

Legal status: public

Total budget: EUR 221 298.00

ERDF budget: EUR 165 973.50

SABELLA S.A.S.

Name: SABELLA S.A.S.

Address: Quimper, France

Legal status: private

Total budget: EUR 333 109.00

ERDF budget: EUR 249 831.75

Magallanes Renovables S.L.

Name: Magallanes Renovables S.L.

Address: Redondela, Spain

Legal status: private

Total budget: EUR 328 055.00

ERDF budget: EUR 246 041.25

Université Le Havre Normandie

Name: Université Le Havre Normandie

Address: Le Havre, France

Legal status: public

Total budget: EUR 243 534.00

ERDF budget: EUR 182 650.50

Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult

Name: Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult

Address: Glasgow, United Kingdom

Legal status: private

Total budget: EUR 221 205.00

ERDF budget: EUR 165 903.75

Summary

Project name (PT): Investigação multimodal na fiabilidade de conversores de energia das marés

Project name (ES): Investigación multi-modelos de la fiabilidad de convertidores de energía mareomotriz

Project name (FR): Étude multi-modèle sur la fiabilité des hydroliennes

Project name (EN): Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Project acronym: MONITOR

Period: 2014-2020

Date of latest update: 2023-03-02

Website: http://www.atlanticarea.eu/

Project start date: 2017-08-29

Project end date: 2021-04-30

Project status: closed

Total budget/expenditure: EUR 2 188 839.00

European Union funding: EUR 1 641 629.25

Co-financing sources: ERDF

Partners map

Partners and Projects info

Coláiste na hOllscoile Corcaigh

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

European Marine Energy Centre

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

Universidade do Algarve

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

SABELLA S.A.S.

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

Magallanes Renovables S.L.

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

Université Le Havre Normandie

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Partners and Projects info

Swansea University

Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Lead partner

Project partner

Information regarding the data in keep.eu on the programme financing this project

Financing programme

2014 - 2020 INTERREG VB Atlantic Area

Last month that data in keep.eu was retrieved from the Programme's website or received from the Programme

2021-08-01

No. of projects in keep.eu / Total no. of projects (% of projects in keep.eu)

71 / 71 (100%)

No. of project partnerships in keep.eu / Total no. of project partnerships (% of project partnerships in keep.eu)

718 / 718 (100%)

Notes on the data

Information provided by the Programme. Achievements were retrieved by Interact from the Programme website (http://www.atlanticarea.eu/), or a website directly linked from it, on 2021-12-03 and 2023-02-02. Fields project name and description (from 23 projects) translated from Spanish into English using the European Commission's eTranslation machine translation service.

The projects which fields include an eTranslation English text are the ones with the following acronyms: @BluePortS, 4H-CREAT, ACCESS2SEA, AGEO, AGRITOX, ALERTOX-NET, AtlanticFoodExport, ATLANTIC-KET-MED, AT-VIRTUAL, AYCH, CABFishMAN, CircularSeas, COCKLES, CONSORTEX, FAN-BEST, iFADO, IN 4.0, JONAS, MONITOOL, NANOCULTURE, PROTOATLANTIC, SIRMA and USER-FACTOR.

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Multi-model investigation of tidal energy converter reliability

Description

Themes

Partners

Summary

Partners map

Information regarding the data in keep.eu on the programme financing this project

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