The wave tank testing facility is expected to be completed in early 2012.
The facility will allow model testing in both multi-directional waves and variable direction currents, and will also be able to model shallow and deep water conditions. It will enable the testing of scale models of wave and tidal energy devices individually and in arrays.
PRIMaRE is a GBP12.6 million project set up two years ago by the Universities of Exeter and Plymouth, with funding from the South West RDA.
PRIMaRE, and the wave tank facility, support and complement the South West RDA’s GBP42 million Wave Hub project, which will create wave energy test site 10 miles of the Cornish coast and will be commissioned in 2010.
Business Minister Lord Drayson said “This wave tank will play to the UK’s strengths – science, engineering, waves and tides – to help us establish a global lead in developing the technologies necessary to produce this renewable energy supply. Wave technology will be key to future of energy generation and the South West, the UK’s first Low Carbon Economic Area, has the potential and expertise to make this happen.”
South West RDA’s Offshore Renewable Energy Manager Jonny Boston said: “This new laboratory will be a first in the UK and will offer the marine renewables industry a state of the art test facility backed by the considerable academic and research expertise of PRIMaRE. It is the latest step in our ambition to be a global centre for marine energy research.”
Dr Deborah Greaves, Reader in Coastal and Marine Engineering at the University of Plymouth, said: “The proposed new wave tank testing facility is already generating quite a stir in the marine renewables industry because of the full range of testing that it will offer. Not only can we test the performance of wave and tidal devices, but we can also model how these devices might impact on coastal conditions.”
