French hydrokinetic developer HydroQuest will be the first company to test its tidal technology at the recently launched SEENEOH testing site.
HydroQuest will test four bi-directional turbines with the capacity of 80kW on a 50-tonne floating testing barge named Bilbao, the SEENEOH tidal testing center revealed.
The testing will last for 12 months, starting in November 2017, according to SEENEOH.
The SEENEOH test site, located on the Garonne river in the French city of Bordeaux, became fully operational early in March 2017, when the final testing berth was connected to the grid.
The site features three testing berths designed to trial tidal devices with either mounted or floating fixation type, along with the 250kW connection to the onshore substation.
HydroQuest’s turbines use cross-flow double vertical axis technology, and their implementation and maintenance is facilitated through the fixing to a floating barge anchored by underwater cables and liftable turbine columns.
The company is developing hydrokinetic technology for both river and ocean application, and was recently selected by the French Agency for Environment and Energy Management (ADEME) to develop a 2MW in-river tidal energy project on the river Rhône in the eastern France that will feature 39 of its river turbines.
Also, late in 2016, ADEME chose HydroQuest, and Constructions Mécaniques de Normandie (CMN), to jointly install a 1MW ocean hydrokinetic tidal turbine off Brittany, France.