ORPC Ireland, Queen’s begin X-Flow project for hydrokinetic turbine testing

Hydroelectric solutions developer ORPC Ireland (Dublin) and Queen’s University Belfast (QUB) have announced the successful deployment and commencement of testing of marine hydrokinetic turbine technology at the Strangford Lough Tidal Test Site. The system is similar to ORPC’s patented RivGen Power System, which uses cross-flow technology to harness tidal and river currents; when placed perpendicular to river or tidal currents, the foils spin from the force and send renewable energy to an underwater generator. Also like the RivGen, the test struts and foils are manufactured by ÉireComposites (Inverin, Galway, Ireland); the struts are glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP), while the foils are carbon fiber (CFRP).

The deployment is part of the X-Flow project, led by Queen’s, which also includes Applied Renewables Research and Shell Technology – Marine Renewable Program as industry partners, and is supported by the Green Innovation Challenge Fund. Its purpose is to collect data on turbine performance in a real tidal environment, building on laboratory testing undertaken earlier this year at Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche’s large towing tank in Rome, Italy, during the European Commission-funded project CRIMSON. 

This project marks the first time that the company has generated electricity from one of its turbines outside of North America, after 17 previous deployments in the U.S. and Canada.

“The Queen’s Marine Laboratory [QML] Tidal Test Site in Strangford Lough provides developers the opportunity to deploy and monitor their technology in real tidal flows,” Carwyn Frost, senior lecturer at QUB, explains. “The X-Flow project will provide insight on the impact of turbulent flow conditions on the control of the cross-flow turbine and its blade loading. The fully instrumented turbine by ORPC will provide vital data for assessing the impact of turbulent flow conditions on performance, blade loading and control. This work will facilitate condition monitoring for predictive maintenance approaches and validation data for numerical simulations.”

In the previous CRIMSON project, researchers tested a five-meter-long foil. Tests included 1.3 million fatigue cycles in dry laboratory conditions and intense stress testing to determine how it withstood operational loads.

The next phase of the X-Flow project will include the testing and monitoring of the turbine through a range of operating conditions. Other work packages will focus on validating and enhancing numerical models of tidal energy turbines using the data collected from this deployment in Strangford Lough, and a study of the benefits that tidal energy can provide to Northern Ireland’s electricity system.

“This deployment and research is helping to maximize design efficiency and performance of our power systems,” says Patrick Cronin, director of European operations at ORPC Ireland. “We have been delighted to collaborate with Queen’s University Belfast, the X-Flow project team and our local supply chain partners to successfully achieve this milestone of ORPC’s first deployment in real-sea conditions in Europe. We look forward to the next stage of the project.”