World's First Wave Power Generator Receives Certification For Regular Use (heise.de) 53
"The Norwegian certification agency DNV has certified the commercial wave-driven power generator Corpower C4 for regular use," writes Longtime Slashdot reader Qbertino. "German news site heise.de has a detailed write-up. See a CGI video of the power station and its internals, as well as the company's website [at their respective links]." From the report (translated to English): According to the manufacturer Corpower Ocean, it is the first DNV prototype certificate for a wave energy converter. The certificate confirms that Corpower's technology meets DNV's requirements for structural strength, reliability, and safety, Corpower Ocean announced. The certification process began in the design phase and lasted seven years. DNV oversaw the process from concept development through design, manufacturing, and assembly, to dry-running tests and subsequent operation.
This is an important step, said Patrik Moller, CEO and one of the founders of Corpower Ocean. With the certification, wave energy is no longer just a promising technology, but a proven and financially viable one. This opens up new opportunities for project financing, insurance, and investments in commercial applications. The Corpower C4 wave power plant looks like a normal buoy: It consists of a 19-meter-long floating body with a diameter of 9 meters and a weight of approximately 11 tons. The system is anchored to the seabed. A mechanism inside the buoy converts its up-and-down movements in the waves into a rotary motion. This, in turn, drives a generator that produces electricity. The report notes that the company is "planning the first two industrial-scale wave energy farms off the coasts of Portugal and Scotland," which are scheduled to begin operating sometime between 2027 and 2029.
This is an important step, said Patrik Moller, CEO and one of the founders of Corpower Ocean. With the certification, wave energy is no longer just a promising technology, but a proven and financially viable one. This opens up new opportunities for project financing, insurance, and investments in commercial applications. The Corpower C4 wave power plant looks like a normal buoy: It consists of a 19-meter-long floating body with a diameter of 9 meters and a weight of approximately 11 tons. The system is anchored to the seabed. A mechanism inside the buoy converts its up-and-down movements in the waves into a rotary motion. This, in turn, drives a generator that produces electricity. The report notes that the company is "planning the first two industrial-scale wave energy farms off the coasts of Portugal and Scotland," which are scheduled to begin operating sometime between 2027 and 2029.
Repaired links here. (Score:5, Informative)
Somehow the links got borked. Likely during the copy-over from my orignial sub.
Here's the fix:
Heise article. [heise.de]
Video. [youtube.com]
CorPower Website. [corpowerocean.com]
Re:Repaired links here. (Score:5, Interesting)
It's an interesting design. Anchored to the sea bed, with a linear shaft to move up and down on with the waves. It should be highly predictable, like wind and solar. They don't mention how the cost compares to offshore wind, but it's early days and diversity counts for something.
Re:Repaired links here. (Score:5, Interesting)
The thing the certification does is that this thing now meets industrial standards and that you can actually depend on it. Before, it was a prototype. That stage is now past, which means cost, lifetime and reliability can be estimated reliably. Next step is to industrialize production. The added plus is that wave power is much more reliable than wind (because ocean waves are non-local) and predictions and planning can be done days in advance.
What this also shows is that the time-frame from successful demonstration to production-ready product that actually delivers is still around 30-50 years for new industrial machinery and anybody only going for short-term "successes" will have no longer term ones. There is no magic in engineering. Good products are boring, non-flashy and reliable. And that is exactly what you want in infrastructure.
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Unlike wind and solar, tidal generators of all types don't have a "no power is generated due to this or that". Seriously, unless something happens to damage the tidal generators, what's going to stop the movement of water in oceans and seas?
Re:Repaired links here. (Score:4, Interesting)
There is variation in the size of the waves, and thus the amount of power generated.
They are a lot like offshore wind in places like the North Sea. They never stop generating entirely, except for faults, but their output goes varies.
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Good point. I don't know.
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The frequency of ocean waves does not vary a lot, because it's largely driven by the physical properties of the water which also does not vary a lot. Ocean waves are mostly in the 0.10 Hz to 0.50 Hz range.
Amplitude, however... almost nothing to 30+ feet/10 meters peak to trough.
=Smidge=
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The issue is excessive wave motion (hurricane, tsunami, etc), overwhelming the generator and forcing it into a "survival mode" that suspends generation temporarily.
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I imagine it has something akin to a clutch for power generation like many things do, like turbine steam bypasses and other things.
I'm only guessing though, is what you're saying what they said it does?
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Various previous test off Portugal (Score:4, Interesting)
Wow (Score:3)
No - it's about the power of the nuclear lobby (Score:5, Interesting)
Despite the questions and risks associated with nuclear power, serious alternatives have been starved of funding since forever. So, yes, as a result this is an emergent technology rather than the obvious choice for littoral states.
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The incredible power of the ANTI-nuclear lobby that got stupid Merkel to shut down nuclear in Germany and meant they are still now using Russian gas ?
FTFY
It was the Anti- nuclear lobby that fought it in Germany
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The incredible power of the ANTI-nuclear lobby that got stupid Merkel to shut down nuclear in Germany and meant they are still now using Russian gas ?
FTFY
It was the Anti- nuclear lobby that fought it in Germany
I don't think the original post need fixing. It was highlighting the scanty logic of the earlier comment.
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You know that was a long term scheduled phase out? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
They began shutting down plants in 2003.
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Did you read it ?
"On 30 May 2011, the German government announced a plan to shut down all nuclear reactors by 2022.[25] Prior to the decision, Germany's renewable energy sector already provided 17% of Germany's electricity and employed about 370,000 people.[26] *The decision to phase out nuclear power has been called the swiftest change in political course since unification.*
Political writer David Frum *characterised Merkel's decision as a political move to improve her approval ratin
Re: No - it's about the power of the nuclear lobby (Score:2)
Merkel's relationship and strategy with Russia/Putin was complex. I believe her goal was to maintain stability and prevent escalation to avoid conflicts or more serious conflicts. Hindsight is 20-20 and sheâ(TM)s been criticised by many people for how she handled Russia.
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Try again (Score:2)
This is about tidal and wave power. Yes, wind and solar have had lots of investment
Re:No - it's about the power of the nuclear lobby (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah in the USA we pay to NOT install alternative energy sources. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/0... [nytimes.com]
$129 million to "own" the libs.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
There is no reason to be shocked. This is a new type of industrial machinery and these always take something like 30-50 years until all the problems are solved and the product is ready. Running a prototype for a year is easy. Making something that runs low-maintenance and high-reliability for a decade or longer is not. They have managed that now and can now look at mass-production and how to optimize that to bring cost down.
The thing is, and that is probably what has you "shocked" (I guess not really) is that in a time were we are bombarded by constant messages about "breakthroughs", "game changers", "innovations" and such, with basically all of them fake, lies or only incremental improvements, people have forgotten how long it actually takes to do anything right in the engineering space.
Re:Wow (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm pretty shocked that this is the first design receiving commercial approval. I recall having heard about this approach for decades and assumed it was deployed years ago. Guess it's a good illustration of the challenges of working in a marine environment.
Indeed. I recall student group projects for wave and tidal power generation. It was some interesting stuff, some similar to this buoy concept, others underwater sails, and some reminiscent of paddlewheels.
Challenges were not so much the power generation, but transfer to land at scale. and storm survival. Looks like this folk have it figured out, having survived 18.5 meter waves. And in operation 3 years by now. Kudos to them.
Another interesting power generation effort id taking place in the Bay of Fundy. With huge tidal swings there is a huge amount of energy to be harvested. My guess is their main challenge is the extreme tide variations, at one place 15 meters. Most low/high variation is around 10 meters. So we have to deal with bare ground at different times of day, and the rotating time of low and high tide. But they figure they can extract 2500 MW of the 8500 MW kinetic energy there. https://natural-resources.cana... [canada.ca]
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Re: Wow (Score:1)
playing devil's advocate (Score:3, Interesting)
I immediately notice an issue. This "survival mode de-tuning" does nothing to make the buoy less buoyant. And they showed it just staying (vertically) stationary in high waves. That'll reduce power output of course, but the problem is it'll also generate enormous forces on the anchor.
"survival mode" on a wind turbine involves pitching the blades so that less or no energy is being transferred to the blades by the wind, which slows or stops the blades. (that reduces the "interaction" between the wind and the blades) Turbines have a "maintenance brake" that can hold the blade still but it's nowhere near strong enough to hold it in a high wind without pitching the blades, and the wind will tear the brake apart if you try to use just that to slow or stop the blades..
The buoy appears to be trying to use a brake to stop movement, instead of doing something to reduce or stop energy collection, and all that energy you're collecting has to go somewhere. If all you've got is a brake, the energy will go into whatever the brake is holding onto, or start mechanically deforming the brake. It'd be like jamming a stick in the spokes of your bicycle wheel to stop the bike.
They're setting themselves up for a "if it doesn't bend, it will break" sort of situation.
The most obvious response would be to reduce magnetic coupling at the generator, which would allow the buoy to move up and down more easily and thus extract less power from the water. Sort of like adjusting power to the field winding on a generator to regulate the energy being produced. (that's not as easy to do with a wind turbine because the blades just go faster and faster until centrifugal force shatters the blades)
Or pump water into the buoy to make it less buoyant, thus reducing the interaction between the waves and the buoy which would reduce the energy being transferred to it.
But the animation is clearly showing the buoy stopping the arms (braking) and somehow not bobbing up and down as the waves interact with it, so there's a whole lot of energy being stacked up on the internal braking and the anchor as the waves apply a huge up-and-down force on a stationary buoy. Nothing's bending, and something's gonna break.
This kind of reminds me of "solar frickin roadways", where there were obvious design issues that somehow got ignored all the way to large-scale testing. I'd LIKE to see this work, but they need to address this design problem before they do large scale testing and find out the hard way that it won't survive as designed. It looks like right now they haven't done any testing in locations that pushed their "survival mode" anywhere near the level it's going to need to well... survive.
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You talk like this is an experimental prototype. It is not. That is what the whole story is about. I guess you missed that little detail.
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"I immediately notice an issue."
Wow they must really regret not working with a person as smart as you. (Honestly, slashdot is chock full of wannabes these days)
Re: playing devil's advocate (Score:2)
âoeâ¦to dry-running testsâ¦â
Thereâ(TM)s your problem right there!
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None of descriptions describe it this way, but it seems likely that their "wave spring" adjusts the resonance frequency of the system. They talk about getting vertical motion 3x the wave amplitude under normal conditions, so it must be something like that. Because it is on resonance, there are already big differences in the forces (during parts of each cycle) on the anchor under normal wave conditions than you would expect from buoyancy during wave motion.
I don't think they are applying breaking forces du
Confused... (Score:3, Interesting)
The certificate confirms that Corpower's technology meets DNV's requirements for structural strength, reliability, and safety, Corpower Ocean announced.
And
This is an important step, said Patrik Moller, CEO and one of the founders of Corpower Ocean. With the certification, wave energy is no longer just a promising technology, but a proven and financially viable one.
The certification regards strength, reliability, and safety - it doesn't make it a "proven technology" or "financially viable" - the technology may be both, but the government certificate itself doesn't do either.
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This is an important step, said Patrik Moller, CEO and one of the founders of Corpower Ocean. With the certification, wave energy is no longer just a promising technology, but a proven and financially viable one.
The certification regards strength, reliability, and safety - it doesn't make it a "proven technology" or "financially viable" - the technology may be both, but the government certificate itself doesn't do either.
I guess they mean some insurers are willing to (financially) insure an installation of their device now that they got certified.
But yes, such does not mean at all their devices can be operated at a profit - it is still possible that the amount of maintenance required makes the energy harvested too expensive for the market.
They'll just say it kills the fish (Score:3, Interesting)
We can tell the Middle East to go fuck themselves tomorrow completely taking away their power over us if we would just transition to wind, solar and electric cars. But we are so easily confused and distracted.
I'm so sick of people who are easily confused and distracted completely fucking up my entire life. I'm old enough that I'm starting to not care when those people's lives collapse because of their bad political choices, but I really really wish they would stop dragging me down with them.
Re: And god am I ever sick to have to repeat (Score:3, Insightful)
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It kills the fish they gave zero fucks about until Fox News told them to be angry about it.
Re: They'll just say it kills the fish (Score:2)
Not tidal power? (Score:2)
They must be distinguishing this from tidal power, which also gets energy from ocean waves, just using a different mechanism. The Rance Tidal Power Station [wikipedia.org] has been operating since 1966! It produces 240 MW at maximum output, so very much a commercial scale power plant.
Covered a year ago (Score:2)
Undecided With Matt Ferrell did a video on this company and its buoys about a year ago that answers some of the questions posed in the comments. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
tldr; Is it 24x7? (Score:2)
This sounds awesome.
Do they have to safe it when there is a storm? Tiny tsunamis?
Does power level fluctuate with seasons, moon distance, tides or time of day/night?
What are the key issues, i.e. need to clean barnacles or impact on sealife, or diving hazard?