By now, we all know what offshore wind farms look like, and there’s little doubt that we’ll be seeing more of them dotting the cruising grounds of the east and west coasts before too long. But here’s something new that just completed a six-months test in the Atlantic off Portugal, a 62-foot high, 30-foot wide Wave Energy Converter that’s also designed to deliver clean energy to communities and businesses near shore.
CorPower, a Swedish company, is developing WECs that float and bob up and down on the ocean’s surface. The massive C4 test WEC looks like an anchored buoy. Waves lift its air-filled body up and down, and the power system inside harvests energy by converting that up-and-down motion into a rotating motion for running generators.
CorPower says the C4 survived four storms during its test, including one in November with 61-foot waves, higher than any measured there before. It survived because it has an internal WaveSpring technology with a pneumatic cylinder that is tensioned to pull the C4 downward, basically shutting it down, so it sits still in a “transparent” mode no matter how high the waves crest.
In normal sea conditions, the C4 starts bobbing up and down, often twice as fast as the amplitude of the waves, by adjusting its movements. It doesn’t rise at the exact same time as the wave does; it lags behind a bit to collect a little extra energy which then moves it higher.
The CorPower team says they underestimated the C4’s ability to generate power. It actually produced 600 kW, but it was not working at full capacity. The team expects a peak power output of 850 kW when the C4 is up to speed.
The C4 is now back on land for more tweaking, and CorPower is planning new tests with multiple C4 buoys. In the future, it says, it can deploy thousands of smaller, more efficient WEC machines to deliver power for the same price as wind or solar devices, but they will be able to operate whether the wind blows or the sun shines.
Read more at https://corpowerocean.com and see the video below:
