SPAIN

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

The OPERA project, funded under the H2020 programme of the European Commission, presented the main achievements and lessons learnt during the first 18 months of project implementation in October 2017 to the European Commission. The project, under the coordination of TECNALIA, is making good progress in different aspects such as open-sea operating data collection and streaming, mooring loads assessment and reduction, power take-off reliability and performance, controls algorithms for reliability and performance, applicability and extension of IEC Technical Specifications, lifetime offshore logistics and risks management, cost of energy and overall assessment. The OPERA team received a very useful feedback from the European Commission and from the experts of its Advisory Board that will help improve the implementation of the project until its completion in July 2019. The project also received the Yoshio Masuda Memorial prize for its contribution to the 12th European Wave and Tidal Conference (EWTEC17) held in September in Cork, Ireland. The prize committee decided to award the OPERA consortium as a whole, since multiple high-quality conference publications were presented by IST, Edinburgh University, Exeter University and TECNALIA to inform about the progress in the development of OWC systems. Most of the project results are public and can be downloaded from the project website: http://opera-h2020.eu

Three projects are running within the OCEANERA-NET programme with Spanish participation:

• TECNALIA is leading a consortium with other partners from Spain (Zunibal, Ditrel and Basque Energy Cluster), Portugal (WavEC), Ireland (Smartbay) and UK (ORE Catapult). The so called RECODE project is developing and testing cost-effective components specifically designed for reliable and sustainable delivery of ocean energy. These components comprise a safety monitoring and control device, a wave measurement buoy, an umbilical cable monitoring device and an underwater device-to-cable connector for a floating energy converter.
   
• IK4-Azterlan, IK4-Gaiker and Mikra Recubrimientos S.L. are working together on the OCEANIC project focused on the development of corrosion and fouling resistant coatings for ocean energy structures, which are being tested at BiMEP open sea test facility
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• The project SE@PORTS deals with the use of breakwaters for wave energy development. Breakwaters are designed to withstand wave action and promote the dissipation of wave energy at the entrance of the seaport, creating sheltered conditions for port activities. The high potential of these structures for the integration of Wave Energy Converters, due to their high exposure to ocean waves, triggered the SE@PORTS project. This project intends to demonstrate this approach is a win-win solution for both breakwaters and WEC solutions in a large extent. This project consortium is composed by INEGI, UNIVERSITY OF PORTO, IH CANTABRIA, PLOCAN, IMDC, FORUM OCEANO.

2017 brought the launch of the first call for trans-national access to European offshore renewable energy test facilities within the MARINET2 project. This project, funded by the European Commission under the Research Infrastructure section of H2020, has the participation of 7 Spanish partners: BiMEP, CENER, CTC, EVE, IH Cantabria, PLOCAN and TECNALIA being the Marine Corrosion Test Site “El Bocal” of CTC one of the most required test facility in this first call.

TRL+ is a “Retos-Colaboración” project funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness within which BiMEP and IH Cantabria collaborate to enhance technological and scientific solutions for marine renewable energy in deep and very deep waters with a market oriented approach and supporting industry needs. This project produced a complete and useful report with the Metocean Analysis of BiMEP for Offshore Design in March 2017.

The project ORPHEO (2016-2018) awarded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness to analyse the profitability of hybrid floating platforms to harness the wind and wave energy has continued with the activity reaching the objectives planned for 2017. This project consortium is composed by INGETEAM, ENEROCEAN, University of Cadiz, University of Malaga and PLOCAN.

Rotary Wave obtained funding of the European Union’s Horizon 2020 programme under grant agreement No 774021, within an instrument to support SMEs. The phase 1 was completed in 2017 to study the development and market uptake of an innovative system to obtain electrical energy from ocean wave resources. In addition, Rotary Wave obtained in December of 2017, an Innoglobal project to study the feasibility of implementation of a Butterfly WEC in Colombia and regional funds from IVACE (Valencian Institute of Business Competitiveness):

• CREATEC (Projects from Creation of technology-based companies) to design and develop a mechanical test bench to prove mechanical components of Wave energy converters devices,
   
• I+D PYME (R&D programme for SMEs), to increase the capture of power of Butterfly WEC Floats
   
• International programme, to develop the market study of Butterfly WEC.

During 2017, SENER has carried out two test campaigns in order to calibrate SENERWave, a software designed internally to simulate floating and fixed devices in real sea conditions, which allows the optimization of devices and arrays, as well as the calculation of project costs, including LCOE, for each location. First tests were made in the TOD tank that is located in the Universidad de Cantabria in May, while the second campaign was carried out throughout MARINET2 funds in the LiR facility in Cork, Ireland.

SENER Tank testing campaign in Cantabria

The University of the Basque Country, TECNALIA and BCAM (the Basque Centre for Applied Mathematics) signed, in November 2017, a collaboration agreement between the three organisations to set up a Joint Research Lab on Offshore Renewable Energy. The main goal of the initiative is to increase organizations’ international visibility, facilitate technology and knowledge transfer to the Basque industry, and to train future professionals for the offshore renewable energy sector. Connected to this initiative, a Master in Offshore Renewable Energy was established and approved by the European Commission as an Erasmus Mundus Masters Course in 2017. The Master is led by the University ofa the Basque Country in collaboration with NTNU (Norway), Strathclyde University (Scotland) and Ecole Central Nantes (France) plus the support of some 40 entities from all over Europe.

Wedge Global, jointly with CTC and DEGIMA has been developing SMARTWEC Project, aiming at optimizing wave energy converters point absorber type by increasing offshore reliability and energy output. The project has been funded by SODERCAN (Cantabria Regional Government) with the objective of developing a strategy for the supply of wave energy devices from Cantabria to the main potential markets, as well as to analyse the technical-economic viability of a wave energy farm off the Cantabrian coast.