• Energy Research
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• 2016 close

Much of the challenge for wind energy investors is that wind turbine technology is a capital-intensive industry. The capital costs of a wind power project can be broken down into several categories, where 13% is attributable to rotor blades, which become decisive in reducing costs. In order to increase the efficiency further, and to extract more energy, the trend is to make the turbines larger. However, as the length of current rotor blades increase, their associated cost and weight increase at a faster rate than the turbine’s potential power output, not being economically viable to produce turbines beyond a certain size. Furthermore, as blades get longer they are becoming increasingly difficult to manufacture and transport. In sum, the technical and commercial performance of wind turbines is currently limited by the rotor blade technology and to overcome this problem new design approaches and/or new materials and standardisation of production processes are needed. Leveraging on this market opportunity, Winfoor (WF) and Marstrom Composite (MC) are partnering to develop and introduce a new and ground-breaking technology to the wind energy market. The novel technology, Triblade, is a “3-in-1 blade” that will allow rotor blades to double current size and to reduce 80% weight, whilst reducing around 70% production costs and increasing ease of transport and installation. Commercialisation of Triblade will allow global wind manufacturers to produce larger and more efficient turbines, with simpler installation process and shorter time to market. The companies hold complementary skills, expertise and roles required to market this unique technology, being well positioned to guide Triblade to a sustained market entry and ceasing a market opportunity for an accumulated turnover of approx. €87 million in a period of 5 years.

The Hi-ThermCap project offers a solution for the macro-encapsulation of phase-change materials (PCM) for use in gaseous and aqueous systems as a heat transfer medium. The expected outcome of this innovation project is to put at the market’s disposal a unique solution for thermal energy storage in heating and cooling systems in Europe. The heating industry is recognized as the sector with the biggest energy-saving potential in Europe. In the low temperature range of -20 to +100°C, most of the thermal energy amounts are required and then discarded, in particular in our buildings and industries. PCM are recognized among the key materials to save these huge energy and – at the same time – CO2 amounts. They can run through a reproducible phase-change at a substance-specific temperature, during which the thermal energy is either stored in very large amounts or returned at a constant temperature. Since decades, an adequate method is being sought to transfer PCM into a user-friendly form. Both existing micro- and macro-encapsulation solutions for PCM storage have until now revealed not industrially and economically viable enough for a broad application. The most common solution in use in Europe is sensible heat storage (e.g. water storage tank) that has a low energy density and thermal storage capacity. ESDA offers an affordable, easy-of-use, high-capacity and high-performance solution in the form of a PCM-filled capsule able to function in combination with all heat exchangers, including renewable energy technologies. The markets addressed are the high-volume heating and cooling market for residential and service sector buildings in Europe, but also the very promising industrial heating and cooling market. ESDA first calculations foresee a large impact in the application with solar thermal collectors and heat pumps, with a cumulated turnover of €2,256M and additional 75 job creations at strategic European locations within the first 6 years after project completion.

In the current context of more than 50% dependency on energy imports, increasing fuel and electricity prices and climate change threats, Europe is in a great need to foster its internal production of renewable energy. Small wind can play an important role in meeting this challenge by providing reliable decentralized renewable energy. However, there are a number of technical and economic barriers the small wind industry needs to overcome in order to become fully competitive. These include low performances in urban environments with slow and turbulent winds, high noise levels, need for reliable safety systems to avoid over-speeding, risks to birds and high upfront investments for the purchase and installation of the technology. Existing market solutions only cover a certain range of wind speeds and have low performances in slow winds. They also cause uncomfortable noise with levels that can reach 60dBA - above WHO standards (40 – 55 dBA) - while posing a collision hazard for birds during flight. In economic terms, the average final installed costs of a small wind turbine are around €10,000 to €15,000. SEESWIND is the first technology in the small wind market that offers solutions to cover the full range of winds and user demands thanks to its modular and easy to install (plug & play) configuration, ensuring a silent (0 dBA), efficient and safe performance while reducing by 10-40% the overall final cost for the user. SEESWIND’s feasibility study will aim at exploring our commercial strategy, including the definition of modules with highest commercial interest, technical feasibility and markets analyses, as well as a ‘freedom to operate’ study, in order to define our SEESWIND business plan. SEESWIND will be out in the market by 2018 at a selling price of € 6,300. We expect a six fold increase of our sells between 2018 and 2023, which with a 30% margin will provide €9.3 million benefits in five years. This will allow a Return of Investment (ROI) rate of 3.4.

Considerable challenges remain today regarding Europe´s transition towards a decarbonised energy system that meets the economic and social needs of its citizens. Rebound effects, that is, a full or partial cancelling-out of efficiency gains over time through increased overall energy use, highlight the centrality of consumption in multi-scalar decarbonisation efforts, urgently requiring attention from scientists and policy makers. Calls also abound for innovative, research-led programmes to enhance the social acceptability of energy transition initiatives and technologies. Understanding how culture-specific views and practices and energy policy and governance both shape and reflect individual and collective energy choices is of paramount importance for the success of the Energy Union. ENERGISE responds directly to these challenges by engaging in frontier energy consumption scholarship. Recognising the persistence of diverse energy cultures, both within and between countries, ENERGISE offers an ambitious social science programme to enhance understanding of changes in energy consumption practices across 30 European countries. Moving beyond state-of-the-art research, ENERGISE theoretically frames and empirically investigates socio-economic, cultural, political and gender aspects of the energy transition. It also examines how routines and ruptures (re)shape household energy consumption practices. Adopting a cutting-edge Living Labs approach, designed specifically to facilitate cross-cultural comparisons, ENERGISE fuses tools for changing individual- and community-level energy consumption with a novel method for energy sustainability assessment. ENERGISE will open new research horizons and greatly enhance Europe’s capacity for high-impact, gender-sensitive consumption research. It also offers timely support for public- and private-sector decision-makers who grapple with the design and implementation of measures to effectively reduce household energy consumption.

The Multi-Use in European Seas (MUSES) project will review existing planning and consenting processes against international quality standards for MSP and compliance with EU Directives used to facilitate marine and coastal development in the EU marine area to ensure that they are robust, efficient and facilitate sustainable multi use of marine resources. The project will build knowledge of the appropriate techniques to minimize barriers, impacts and risks, whilst maximising local benefits, reducing gaps in knowledge to deliver efficiencies through integrated planning, consenting processes and other techniques. MUSES Project - 3 main pillars: 1. Regional overviews which take into account EU sea basins (Baltic Sea, North Sea, Mediterranean Sea, Black Sea and Eastern Atlantic) will be based on an analytical framework to facilitate adoption of a common approach across the sea basins. The progress in implementation of the concept of Multi-Uses in European Sea Basins will be assessed and key obstacles and drivers identified. 2. A comprehensive set of case studies of real and/or potential multi-use will be conducted and analysed to provide a complete spectrum of advantages in combining different uses of the sea. The case studies will create local stakeholder platforms to identify multi-use potentiality, opportunities and limitations. 3. Development of an Action Plan to address the challenges and opportunities for the development of Multi-Uses of oceans identified in the regional overviews and case studies. Provide recommendations for future action, taking into account national, regional and sea basin dimensions. The project will build on work undertaken in other studies including Mermaid, TROPOS, H2Ocean and SUBMARINER. MUSES project partners have direct links with related forums including The Ocean Energy Forum (OEF) which will assist understanding of many issues that need to be addressed at an EU level and could help facilitate and implement the OEF roadmap.

Wind energy is an attractive solution for the energy demands of remote installations. It could provide energy to remote Base Station Sites, which account for up to 50% of the total operational costs in the Telecommunication Industry. It is also a feasible source of energy in the agricultural sector. Farms spend around €50.000/year in power supply due to their remote location with respect to power plants. Installation of Small Wind Turbines (SWT) that allow energy harvesting on-site will produce operational cost savings of €32.000/year. However, large purchase costs and long return of investment (25-30 years) are strong barriers for wind power implementation. Responding to these market needs, at EVR Motors we have invested so far €1.000.000 of private capital to develop a novel direct drive generator: SWITLER. Using a lean philosophy design and eliminating non-desirable features we achieve a manufacturing cost reduction of up to 60%. Reducing magnet mass materials in 20% and eliminating iron from the rotor, we reduce the generator weight by up to 70% when compared to current solutions in the market. Furthermore, efficiency is increased in as much as 96%. Our generator removes the need of a transformer, which enables the use of SWT applications off-grid in remote areas. This already patented (approval in process) technology will revolutionize the Small Wind Turbine manufacturer’s value of chain. Our objective is to start SWITLER commercialization by 2017 introducing it in the SWT market. This market is expected to increase massively from €768 million in 2013 to €2.517 million by 2020, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 22%. Our market strategy will focus on Israel for the first two years. We will then percolate the European market through UK, which accounts for 13% of the global market. After the 6 initial commercialization years, SWITLER sales are forecasted to accumulate €25.728.000 revenues.

We have developed a resource-efficient and affordable bladeless Vortex wind generator. VORTEX Bladeless´ innovative wind turbine represent a true breakthrough in the wind energy market. The Vortex wind generator device represents a new paradigm of harnessing wind, with a new disruptive concept of a wind power generator without blades. VORTEX is able to capture the wind kinetic energy by 'vortex shedding', transforming it into electricity. The technology seeks to improve issues such as maintenance, amortization, noise, environmental impact, logistics and visual aspect, performing a secure, clean and efficient energy product, that is half cheaper than current small wind turbines (SWT). VORTEX make renewable energies, (replacement of PV, wind energy, combination of both) more financially accessible for our end-users: ESCOS, installation companies, businesses, home-owners, vessels, isolated housed, telecom station, etc. Clients will benefit from this new technology, especially in areas where solar energy does not perform well. Vortex has yielded excellent results and lots of industry and commercial interest. We have a 6-meter Vortex Bladeless wind turbine pilot in Spain, which generates up to 40% of energy solely from wind. The technology has been tested for scalability.. Our goal for Phase 2 is to scale-up and test a 2,75–meter version of the Vortex Wind Generator (providing 100W for future commercialization and massive market uptake. We want to achieve the goals of becoming the designer, manufacturer and seller of the first-ever bladeless wind generator for the Small Wind Market (SWM). Combing our patented and market-backed technology with improved properties, we want to reinvigorate the SWM - addressing EU 2020 energy targets - with our Vortex Bladeless wind generators, positioning us as leader of the sector. Our end-users will also see their pay-back returned within 5 years, thanks to its market-changing commercialization price

SDHp2m stands for ‘Solar District Heating (SDH)’ and actions from ‘Policy to Market’. The project addresses market uptake challenges for a wider use of district heating and cooling systems (DHC) with high shares of RES, specifically the action focuses on the use of large-scale solar thermal plants combined with other RES in DHC systems. The key approach of the project is to develop, improve and implement in 9 participating EU regions advanced policies and support measures for SDH. In 3 focus regions Thuringia (DE), Styria (AT) and Rhone-Alpes (FR) the regulating regional authorities are participating as project partners to ensure a strong implementation capacity within the project. In 6 follower regions from BG, DE, IT, PL, SE the regulating authorities are engaged through letters of commitment. The project activities aim at a direct mobilization of investments in SDH and hence a significant market rollout. The project work program in the participating regions follows a process including 1) strategy and action planning based on a survey, best practices and stakeholder consultation 2) an implementation phase starting at an early project stage and 3) efficient dissemination of the project results at national and international level. Adressed market uptake challenges are: Improved RES DHC policy, better access to plant financing and business models, sustained public acceptance and bridging the gap between policy and market through market support and capacity building. Denmark and Sweden reached already today a high share of RES in DHC and shall be used as a role model for this project. The direct expected outcome and impact of SDHp2m is estimated to an installed or planned new RES DHC capacity and new SDH capacity directly triggered by the project until project end corresponding to a total investment of 350 Mio. € and leading to 1 420 GWh RES heat and cold production per year. A multiple effect is expected in the period after the project and in further EU regions.

Energy storage technologies have long been a subject of great interest to both academia and industry. The aim of this project is to develop a novel, cost effective and high performance Latent Heat Thermal Energy Storage System (LHTESS) for seasonal accumulation of solar energy in increased quantities. The major barrier for currently used Phase Change Materials (PCMs, organic and hydrated salts) is their very low heat conduction coefficient, low density, chemical instability and tendency to sub-cooling. Such inferior thermo-physical properties result in the LHTESS having large dimensions and not having a capacity to provide the necessary rate of heat re-charge and discharge, even with highly developed heat exchangers. The new approach to overcome the above issues is the deployment of low grade, eutectic low melting temperature metallic alloys (ELMTAs). The ELMTAs are currently produced for application in other areas and have not been actively considered for the thermal energy accumulation with the exception of very limited studies. Their heat conduction is two orders of magnitude greater than that of conventional PCMs, they are stable and provide the thermal storage capacity which is 2-3 times greater per unit of volume. The project consists of both theoretical and experimental investigations. A range of low grade ELMTAs for application in LHTESS will be selected and Differential Scanning Calorimetry will be used to measure their thermal properties. Thermal cycling tests of such alloys will be conducted. Numerical investigations of heat transfer and flow in the LHTESS with ELMTAs will be performed. Experimental studies of heat transfer and flow in a laboratory prototype of the LHTESS with ELMTAs will be conducted. As outcomes of investigations, dimensionless heat transfer correlations will be derived and design recommendations for a practical solar energy seasonal LHTESS with the low grade ELMTA will be produced for project industrial partner

The EU Agency for Safety & Health is currently amending wind turbine standards (such as EN 50308) to ensure safer O&M tasks and increase the Probability Of Detection (POD) for wind turbine defects. ISO have also identified such issues, and in fact initiated the development of QA standards specifically tailored for the Condition Monitoring (CM) of wind turbines. Current CM systems are intrusive, and hence revoke the initial OEM warranty of drive-train components. The combination of industrial and legislative factors is the key driver behind the production of CMDrive: a bespoke and non-intrusive acoustic-analysis CM system, having a POD for drive-train defects of 90-98% within the range of operating powers. The requested grant of €2.5m will be required to validate and enhance the system, and initiate the commercialisation process. Growth in the wind services sector, as related to O&M and CM, is also compelling, as studies by Deloitte have shown that the corresponding market is estimated to increase from €5.2b to €10.8b by 2020, with a CAGR of 10%. The first generation of CMDrive shall be produced for wind turbines of 2.5MW or less; a next generation product, to handle larger turbines, has already been envisioned. The commercialisation strategy involves the segmentation of the wind turbine market into 3 initial customer tiers, is targeting WFOs and Independent Service Providers of CM within such tiers, and will position the product through a number of Unique Selling Points, which will be elaborated further in this proposal. The locations of the 5 partners, in addition to the global outreach of TWI and INESCO, are critical factors for launching the product by 2019. It is expected that CMDrive’s associated revenue streams (sales, services, licensing) will yield an estimated ROI of 1100%, and corresponding cumulative profits of €26m, over the 5 year forecast (2019–2023). INESCO will take lead of the sales, with the other partners benefiting by means of profit shares.