Development of innovative power take-off and control systems for wave energy devices

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• Demonstrated increased performance and reliability of wave energy devices.
• Improved knowledge on how to operate wave energy devices, their availability, maintainability and survivability.
• Reduction of LCOE.
• Reinforced industrial supply chain in Europe.

Power take-off (PTO) and control systems (including "prime mover" (waves to mechanical power) as well as the ancillary equipment like gearboxes, generators, and power electronics, power controllers, grid interfaces and other items) are key subsystems of wave energy converters. PTO and control systems can be improved to increase the efficiency of the whole converter, to increase reliability by controlling for instance the structuring health and power electronics, and to avoid extreme events that might compromise device survivability. Control systems dynamically adapt to and mitigate the forces of the continually changing ocean conditions. This can prevent damage during extreme events, contribute to increased performance and the viability of the technology. The manufacturing and testing of prototypes are relatively costly, and it is imperative that data from the demonstration are available to avoid repeating early engineering mistakes. Validation of the innovative concepts is expected to be done in realistic environments at small scale for longer periods or by onshore testing and controlled lab testing. If validation is done onshore the project should demonstrate that they can make use of existing test rigs or develop a test rig for the project, which can be used after the project by other developers. Development and demonstration of the PTO technology should be combined with control strategies as their requirements are inherently coupled. In the validation it is expected that key performance indicators are used based on international recognized metrics

In the development of the PTO system the ‘circularity by design’ principle should be used.

Activities are expected to achieve TRL 5 by the end of the project – see General Annex B.