DEVELOPMENT AND MARKET UPTAKE OF INNOVATIVE SYSTEM TO OBTAIN ELECTRICAL ENERGY FROM OCEAN WAVE RESOURCES

Project Information

BUTTERFLY

Grant agreement ID: 774021

DOI

10.3030/774021

Project closed

EC signature date 12 May 2017

Start date 1 April 2017

End date 30 September 2017

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine, maritime and inland water research, and the bioeconomy

Total cost

€ 71 429,00

EU contribution

€ 50 000,00

Coordinated by

ROTARY WAVE S.L.
Spain

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - BUTTERFLY (DEVELOPMENT AND MARKET UPTAKE OF INNOVATIVE SYSTEM TO OBTAIN ELECTRICAL ENERGY FROM OCEAN WAVE RESOURCES)

Reporting period: 2017-04-01 to 2017-09-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Renewable Energy Sources (RES) are playing a significant role in the EU energy system, contributing to the reduction of carbon emissions and improving the diversification of energy supplies, which reduces dependency on fossil fuel markets. In this context, Ocean Energy is a renewable, abundant, predictable and geographically diverse energy with high potential to add substantial value to the EU energy system. Besides its huge potential and predictability, another important benefit is the fact that ocean energy installations are likely to face much less severe space constrains for installation compared to onshore RES technologies. Regarding ocean energy, wave energy is the ocean energy type with highest deployment potential in EU waters. However, although the potential of wave energy is huge, all MW installed of wave energy are in R&D phase due to several technology, market, administrative and environmental issues.

The general objective of BUTTERFLY project is focused on the development, demonstration and further commercialization of an efficient system that harvest the ocean energy from waves to produce cost-competitive and sustainable electricity.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

During Phase 1 of SME Instrument, two main activities have been assessed:

- Technical assessment and feasibility of the concept, including the analysis of the wave energy resources in different locations, the study of the integration with other existing technologies and next steps to reach the market, surveys have been performed among potential clients and collaborations with stakeholders for analysis of public acceptance, environmental analysis, standardisation or its potential involvement as prescribers for BUTTERFLY replication.

- Commercial assessment and economic feasibility, including market analysis, business and exploitation plans, the economic and risk assessment and the actions to expand and strength the stakeholders net during SME Instrument Phase I.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The main novelties of BUTTERFLY technology are conditioned by the youth of ocean energy industry. Most of the technologies are still in development of demonstration stages and have not reached the market. Therefore, BUTTERFLY has focused its innovations in the mains aspects that will facilitate the market introduction:
- Maximising capture efficiency to more that 90%.
- Maximising conversion efficiency to more than 86%.
- Reductions of CAPEX cost.
- Wide versatility of the system, capable to be adaptable to different type of waves, from 0.5 to 6 meters.
- Sustainability of the system, avoiding submerged electric currents and oil spills into the sea.

In this context, BUTTERFLY project will provide a cost-effective solution to make wave energy affordable and environmentally sustainable, contributing to reduce carbon emissions and dependency on fossil fuels and improving the diversification of energy supplies towards a renewable energy system.

Main concept of BUTTERFLY technology