Wave Energy Scotland funds control systems trio

Wave Energy Scotland (WES) has selected three of the most promising control systems concepts from its technology program to share a little over £630,000 to further develop their ideas.

SgurrControl will bring their experience of onshore and offshore wind developments and work with Cruz Atcheson on the first project. They were awarded £187,409.

MaxSim’s winning submission builds on experience from several key Scottish wave energy companies and was awarded £187,500.

The final project to be selected was from Queen Mary University of London who will work with University of Exeter and Mocean Energy from Edinburgh. The team was awarded £151,304.

The research projects funded are expected to conclude in nine months’ time, according to WES.

Tim Hurst, Managing Director at WES, said: “These three projects represent the best new concepts for controls that can be best applied to novel wave energy converters. I’m pleased that we are utilizing the experience from Scottish developers and growing that knowledge base at home.”

The control system for a wave energy converter is an essential sub-component and can constitute a complex piece of technology. Computer simulations and state of the art technologies can be combined to create a new approach for controlling wave energy converters, WES said.

The best projects were selected from the original series of 13, which were recently completed, the subsidiary of Highlands and Islands Enterprise – WES noted.

Fully funded by the Scottish government, the organization takes a progressive and collaborative approach to tackling the issues which have proved challenging in the wave energy sector and is driving the development of wave energy technology in Scotland and beyond.