• Energy Research
• 2014 close
• 2015 close

The expansion of renewable energy, as part of a transition to a sustainable energy economy, has large potential to mitigate the risks associated with anthropogenic climate change. In this context, wind power is an important energy resource. The issue of public and private sector investment in wind power is a collective action problem involving a range of stakeholders, including: wind turbine companies; the National Grid; the Department of Energy and Climate Change; energy infrastructure engineers; and energy investors. However, the wind power resource base is, by its very nature, sensitive to fluctuations in climate (Edenhofer et al. 2011). This sensitivity has implications for how the costs assumed in investment decisions evolve into the future. For instance, there may be a risk of stranded assets should wind patterns change significantly over the lifetime of a wind farm. Therefore, decision-making about the positioning of future wind turbines and investment in associated infrastructure requires information relating to wind potential patterns under different scenarios of climate change, the spatial distribution of the existing transmission network, and the decision-making criteria of key stakeholders. There is also a degree of uncertainty associated with some of this information. While some of the uncertainties in the science can be characterised probabilistically, other sources of uncertainty (such as the global policies needed for a particular climate future to be realised) are not probabilistic by nature and so must be treated in a different way in taking investment and deployment decisions. In this context, a framework of Robust Decision-Making (RDM: Lempert, 2013) can be helpful. Rather than seeking an optimal solution, RDM provides a process for identifying strategies that remain robust across a range of potential future scenarios. The aim of the proposed research is to build a robust decision-making tool to help stakeholders identify wind energy investments and placements of turbines or associated infrastructure that produce satisfactory performance metrics across a wide range of possible climate futures. This decision support tool would harness existing advanced climate modelling approaches and decision-making frameworks, to help stakeholders visualise the vulnerabilities and trade-offs of different positioning strategies in the energy market. Climate information will be supplied by the climate model emulator PLASIM-ENTSem (Holden et al., 2013), a sophisticated, yet computationally very fast, approach to representing the climate. The decision-making tool would be developed, tested and evaluated with involvement from the stakeholders. As such, the tool developed would enable stakeholders to identify positioning strategies that are robust to a range of different climate change scenarios, across different Representative Concentration Pathways. In this way, the project would address the challenges of building resilience and managing climate change risks, within the wind energy sector. Edenhofer, O., Pichs-Madruga, R., Sokona, Y., Seyboth, K., Kadner, S., Zwickel, T., Eickemeier, P., Hansen, G., Schlömer, S., Stechow, C. von and Matschoss, P.: Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation: Special Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press., 2011. Lempert, R.: Scenarios the illuminate vulnerabilities and robust responses, Climatic Change, 117, 627-646, 2013 Holden, P. B., Edwards, N. R., Garthwaite, P. H., Fraedrich, K., Lunkeit, F., Kirk, E., Labriet, M. Kanudia, A. and Babonneau, F.: PLASIM-ENTSem: a spatio-temporal emulator of future climate change for impacts assessment, Geoscientific model development discussions, 6(2), 3349-3380, 2013

The UK’s climate change target is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 34% in 2020 and 80% in 2050 [DTI white paper]. Small wind turbines (SWTs) – rated up to 100kW – could be potentially make a significant contribution towards reducing GHG emissions. The Government has introduced a range of incentives to encourage the uptake of SWT technologies, incl. Feed-in-Tariffs (FiT), the Green Deal and removal of the need for planning permissions in some cases. Despite the recent increases in market uptake of SWTs, there remains a number of challenges that restrict both the maximisation of their power output and wider adoption of this promising renewable energy solution. SWTs typically employ fixed-pitch blades, which facilitate simple structure, low cost, and high reliability. However, due to the fixed nature of the blades, SWTs have a tendency to overspeed, causing over-loading problems at excessive wind velocities. Overloading of expensive electrical components is undesirable and often causes irreparable costly damage. An auto-stop feature to prevent such incidences has not become commonplace due to cost and powering supply limitations. The nature of wind and its inherent fluctuations, mean grid connection inverters - which convert DC current to grid compliant AC - must be oversized to deal with any excessive wind. Oversizing is a crude way to deal with the issue, but this approach has become commonplace since incumbent wind inverters are based on technology originally developed for generation of stable solar energy. The result of over specified inverters is highly inefficient (30-40%) power transfer at average site wind speed. FuturEnergy has developed an innovative system concept to overcome these problems. If successful, we will capture roughly 10% of our markets and generate a cumulative revenue total of £13.7million. This revenue will result in a cumulative profit of £5.14million. With an initial investment of £800,000, we estimate an attractive RoI of >600%.

Briareo is an innovative micro-wind turbine intended at offering users a higher efficiency of power generation with low speed winds, thereby increasing the penetration rate of this renewable energy technology throughout the European Union and worldwide. Current commercial micro-turbines operate on average only 20% of the time being unable to work at wind speeds less than 4m/s. This result has given micro-wind turbines an inefficient and undesirable reputation, and they are now scarcely recommended by suppliers as they cannot guarantee their payback time. The patented Briareo polymeric blade has been designed by applying high quality aerodynamic principles to operate in both lift and drag modes according to the specific wind, being especially performing in winds lower than 4m/s. The SME proponents have eventually developed their own turbine which in tests has exhibited a rotational capacity 4x that of current turbines. The Briareo micro-wind turbine is based on the “Ikea” concept: it can be purchased of the shelf, easily self-assembled and installed without needs for certification, not imposing greatly on its residency (smaller than 100cmx150cm) or producing much noise. The high manufacturability of Briareo allows the use of the low cost rotational moulding industrial process. The technology has reached a TRL of 6 and Phase 1 project aims at establishing a robust industrialization and operational plan, at identifying all stakeholders in the value chain securing appropriate suppliers, sale channels and strategic partnerships, at contacting potential early adopters’ communities that can ensure a quick market test and at strengthening the business model with an in-depth market analysis, sound marketing strategy and reliable financial projections. Briareo project is proposed by 2 Italian SMEs, Arken and Gymnotus, who have strictly cooperated on the design, prototype development and test since the beginning, equally sharing the IP ownership.

Flow separation and dynamic stalling in aerofoils result in increased drag, reduced lift and increased dynamic loads on aerodynamic devices/vehicles. This culminates in reduced aerodynamic efficiency and increased structural vibrations, which are noisy and reduce the operating life of aerodynamic devices. To delay flow separations and dynamic stalling, flow control is engaged either actively (artificial means) or passively (natural means). This project describes a novel passive flow control method (Aeropaft) to be applied primarily in the wind turbine (WT) industry, then to aircraft and ground and marine vehicles. Wind energy is the fastest growing Renewable Energy source (RES) at 24.4% per year. To keep pace with growing demand, there is need for advanced technologies to increase the aerodynamic efficiency. Aeropaft is a simple technology exploiting high velocity currents from near the leading edge (via internal ducts) to re-energise the free-stream flow at the top of an aerofoil. This results in a 5% increase in electrical power yield for a 1MW WT, increase in lift (~16%), reduction of profile drag force (~7%) at higher aerofoil angles of incidences (>12o), and the reduction of wear caused by vibrations. We will penetrate 1% of the global WT market and 10% of the European market. Licensed Manufacturers stand to gain a 0.33% increase in market value and revenue of €1.72bn, while utility companies gain €101,013 per annum through savings and increased energy output per WT. Our revenue will come through licensing at 0.2% of the whole turbine cost translating to revenue of €10.3m and profits of €7.72m, five years post commercialization. Phase 1 will entail a market study, partner search, assessing structural integrity issues and developing an IP and commercialisation strategy. Phase 2 will be to modify blades of existing WTs with our technology and test demonstrate in the operational environment.

The project goal is to establish the feasibility of the innovative use of a non contact microphone array for stuctural health diagnostics by vibration detection combined with active noise and vibration cancellation, for all the rotating machinery within an onshore wind turbine nacelle. Novel time and phase reversal techniques for received microphone signals will be investigated experimentally to investigate the possibility of high volume coverage for both vibration detection and cancellation. The array could potentially achieve a step function reduction in wind farm levelised electricity cost through a combination of several cost benefit factors. (1) Machinery lifetime extension, reduced maintenance costs and avoidance of lost revenue through reduced forced downtime and scheduled downtime; (2) Generation of increased revenue through turbine operation at higher wind speeds, increasing the capacity factor: made safely possible through reduced machinery vibration and environmentally possible through reduced noise emission; (3) Reduced noise issue costs. Benefits under all headings are estimated to total £35k per MW year, which is ~25% of an onshore turbine OPEX +CAPEX.

Sunamp Ltd and Heriot Watt University have decided to collaborate to develop a step-change technology in the solar thermal field: heat storage based on phase change materials. Solar thermal has been undervalued at domestic levels in the last years, but it is strongly believed that the proposition of a compact system based on Sunamp Heat Batteries will boost the adoption of a technology that has the capability to significantly reduce the fuel bills for hot water generation, even in Scotland.

WINSPEC will study the feasibility and specification of a marine operated, low frequency modulated ultrasonic 'pulse-echo' method for monitoring the structure and condition of the layered foundations of offshore wind turbines. Numerical modelling and some laboratory testing will be undertaken to evaluate the sensitivity and characteristics of the spectral response to differing layered model representations of the foundation structure with various condition 'defects' built in. This work will provide experimental and modeled analyses to support a feasibility assessment of the 'pulse-echo' approach, where possible, identifying characteristic acoustic patterns (or signatures) that relate to varying the material properties of the layers and structure of the layered sequence, such as thickness and density and the introduction of inter-layer water. This work will be supported by E.ON Technologies (Ratcliffe) Ltd. who are responsible the maintenance of many of the UK's offshore wind farms such as Robin Rigg in the Solway Firth. These wind farms are national assets; for example Robin Rigg provides 180 MW of power to the National Grid (enough energy for over 100, 000 households). This method could form the basis for a safe, low power technology for deployment on underwater unmanned vehicles for inspecting the inner structure and condition of offshore wind turbine foundations. In so doing, WINSPEC would stimulate a shift towards improved asset inspection technologies supporting preventative interventions maintaining wind farm operation at higher generating capacities.