CorPower S3 Launched in Stockholm

CorPower S3 delivers first power to the grid

Following successful system integration and commissioning, the dry test program of the latest generation resonant Wave Energy Converter – CorPower S3 - has started. The first power was delivered to the Swedish grid during April 2017, with the Wave Energy Converter (WEC) operating in simulated waves using a 500kW Hardware-In-the-Loop (HIL) test rig in CorPower’s integration facility in Stockholm. 

The rigorous dry test program has been designed to accelerate the product development and de-risk the upcoming ocean demonstration. The HIL-rig is used to supply the device with mechanical loading representing the full range of sea states, allowing debugging and stabilizing the system in simulated waves up to storm conditions.

Jean-Michel Chauvet, Director of Integration & test at CorPower:

“This dry-testing capability has already proven invaluable to the project, allowing us to reach safe and reliable operation of our machine in a controlled environment. We are currently ramping up the system through safety and functional testing, working step-wise to reach full power. The dry test program will be concluded with non-interrupt testing, aiming to deliver a stable machine with high availability through the upcoming ocean deployment in Scotland” 

Tim Hurst, Managing Director, Wave Energy Scotland:

“ We are very pleased to see CorPower forging ahead with their technology development. Open-sea testing is the next phase and we look forward to welcoming them to the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) in Orkney later this year”

CorPower’s product development follows a structured verification process in five Stages established as best practices for ocean energy devices by International Energy Agency-OES and Wave Energy Scotland. It involves step-wise validation of survivability, performance, reliability and economics starting with small scale prototypes in Stage 1, continued by sub-system testing and then fully integrated WEC in increasing scales up to array demonstration in Stage 5. The current Stage 3 program follows the prior testing of multiple prototypes in smaller scales performed in Portugal, France and Sweden since 2013, and thousands of hours of numerical simulation work.

Delivering this milestone marks an important step for wave energy as the verification of CorPower’s phase controlled WEC technology is expected to bring significant improvement to the reliability and competitiveness of harvesting energy from ocean waves.