SPOTLIGHT ON THE NETHERLANDS
FEATURE SPONSOR
AN ECONOMIC FACILITY FOR TESTING
‘BLUE BARRIER’ TECHNOLOGIES With its bespoke facilities and flexible design, the Dutch Tidal Technology Center (TTC) will ease a major industry bottleneck for the lack of test facilities for ‘blue barrier’ tidal technologies when it opens its doors in 2018
A blue barrier combines the technology of a storm surge barrier with a tidal array. Energy-wise, blue barriers channel tidal waters to turbines to ensure the full use of the tidal flows available. Blue barriers therefore represent a third type of hydrokinetic energy system, alongside conventional hydropower and free-stream offshore tidal energy.
BLUE BARRIER FACILITY The idea behind TTC, which is being built at Grevelingendam, in Zeeland, is to help blue barrier innovators move from promising computer models and tank tests to validated real-world data and to do so without having to secure backing for large-scale demonstrations, which is an often-significant hurdle. Instead, owners of emerging technologies will be able to test, certify and showcase their ideas in a blue barrier facility that is fully operational while being realistic in terms of cost and scale for startup companies and early phase innovations.
40
www.wavetidalenergynetwork.co.uk
NETWORK
TTC forms part of the Delta Works, the network of surge barriers in the southwest of The Netherlands. On opening, the facilities will comprise three test channels varying from three metres wide to 10.5 metres wide, monitor logs and data logs for verification and validation, plus four proprietary demonstration turbines.
Ranging from 0.5MWe to 1MWe, and generating a combined output of 2.5MWe, these turbines will be available to research institutes and universities for their own research. They will also power up to 2,000 nearby homes.
BENEFITS
The setup is ideal for monitoring the impact of tidal energy facilities on morphology and tidal flow patterns, their environmental impact and a host of other variables. For this, TTC works closely with research institutes and other relevant bodies.
The installed turbines are also easy to access from the land. This offers several benefits compared with deep- sea installations, including much lower installation costs, faster installation, quicker repairs and easier maintenance. All these characteristics increase turbine uptime and reduce overall operating costs.
FUTURE
As for the future, the plan is to also make TTC the perfect place to demonstrate how power storage systems could deliver stable and reliable ‘on demand’ output.
Concepts currently being discussed include water-buffering, flywheel technologies, battery systems and collaboration with Power-to- Gas systems.
Tidal Technology Center Grevelingendam (TTC-GD)
TECHNOLOGY CENTRE
TIDAL
SCAN/CLICK
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49
