Ocean energy test sites spanning Europe, Asia, and North America have committed to coordinating procedures and standards to ensure consistency in testing of marine energy converters across the globe at a discussion forum in Halifax, Canada, hosted by the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) and the Fundy Ocean Research Centre for Energy (FORCE) in association with the International Conference on Ocean Energy (ICOE)
EMEC said in a statement that, at the forum, delegates from operational and planned test sites from around the world focused on key issues facing these test sites, such as environmental monitoring, standards development, and operational procedures. They agreed that standards are vital in the development of test centres for ocean energy, and that common ways need to be established for the collection and analysis of data.
“The establishment of a global network of test sites will, I believe, lead to a community of interest with common standards and approaches to the business of marine energy. Common standards, developed by worldwide experience, can only help accelerate the deployment of wave and tidal technologies EMEC managing Director Neil Kermode said in a statement.
“In time, wave and tidal technologies will find their markets in dozens of countries and EMEC wants this to be as easy as possible both for the technology developers at EMEC and the ultimate customer here or overseas. We want a wave or tidal device which is certified at EMEC to be immediately marketable in any country, without expensive and time consuming re-validation,” he added.
According to EMEC, each country has its own unique conditions, both physical and political, and exploring these challenges simultaneously will enable marine energy technologies to develop projects more rapidly than if tackled in isolation.