Scottish Tidal Power “Encouraging” After First Year

12 months have passed since launching the Pelamis P2 wave energy machine off the coast of Orkney in Scotland, and  it’s owners have heralded it’s ‘encouraging’ results after a full year in use.  One of the first of it’s kind, the Pelamis P2 is a wave energy converter owned by ScottishPower Renewables, who have posted up the statistics from the device today – making for some interesting reading.

Since last year, the P2 has:

  • Experienced around 90% of average annual sea state occurrences, swells, waves, seasonal variations etc.
  • Weathered waves up to nine meters in height
  • Racked up 7500 hours connected to the grid (an average of around 20 per day)
  • Exported over 160MWh to the grid

Part of the European Marine Energy Centre, the P2 has undergone a rigorous first year of testing, and has been monitored stringently for it’s energy output by the team in Orkney since being powered-on in May 2012.

Scottish Tidal Power “Encouraging” After First Year

Alan Mortimer, Head of Innovation at ScottishPower Renewables, said: “The past year at EMEC has been an invaluable learning experience for SPR, E.ON and Pelamis.

“The collaboration has worked well and all parties have benefited from sharing of information, risks and innovation.

“The output of the device is steadily increasing as experience is gained and as the controller is fine-tuned for maximum energy extraction.

“We anticipate further significant improvements over the next 12 months, with the remainder of the test plan focused on optimising the power produced in the full range of sea-states in order to progress the technology towards commercially-viable status.”

The data from the last twelve months will prove invaluable to innovation in the field of tidal and wave power, and fuel further enhancements of Pelamis’ ongoing projects, including the active P2 in Orkney.

At present, the proven average output capability of the Pelamis P2 is now close to 100kW (at the EMEC site), however the team at Pelamis say that they could almost double that by optimising the device using the last year’s data.

Scottish Tidal Power

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