Wave Energy Converter(WEC) - Seminar Paper

ABSTRACT 

The WEC is a new, highly efficient technology that harnesses the immense, renewable energy contained in ocean waves. Its unique ability to extract  and convert energy from both the rising and falling of waves,  represents a technological breakthrough.

A wave energy conversion apparatus comprises at least two devices , each comprising a surface float , at least one of the surface floats being rigidly attached to a submerged body . The movement between the at least two devices preferably effects an energy generation which is harnessed by the linkages. 

The apparatus may also include mooring systems that maintain the complete apparatus in a position that is consistent with statutory requirements and not significantly inhibit its efficient operation.

INTRODUCTION

Today more than 80 per cent of the world’s electric power production comes from fossil-fuelled plants. As the demand for electricity is forecasted to increase, there is an urgent need to find new methods to extract electric energy from renewable sources. Renewable electric energy supply is today one of the highest priorities in many parts of the world.

The Kyoto declaration 1997 and the last agreement at Marrakech 2002 are significant proof of this. Both the EU and the US have set their targets on future greenhouse emissions. Ocean waves represent a vast unexplored source of renewable energy. The wave energy potential in the EU has been estimated conservatively as 120–190 TWh/year offshore and an additional 34–46 TWh/year at near shore locations.

However, these estimations depend on assumptions of technology and energy cost. The actual resource could be a magnitude larger. In any case, it will be a challenging task to convert the vast energies in the ocean waves into electric energy. When approaching sustainable electric power production for the future, attention must be paid to the economical constraints.

The social, ecological and environmental impacts also needs to be adressed. The need for research and investigations in this area must not be underestimated.
Today, several countries have national efforts within wave energy. The dominating countries in the development of wave power have so far been Denmark, India, Ireland, Japan, Norway, Portugal, The Netherlands, Australia, UK and USA.

The Swedish waters have been estimated to contain too little wave energy and the general opinion has been that it could not be motivated to do research on small 5–50 kW conversion devices. From the mid eighties the area has been considered difficult and uneconomical. Despite this, one of the more tested technologies has been developed in Sweden, the so-called IPS OWEC Buoy with a power of 100 kW or more. It is now further developed in the USA and UK. The device is pumping water up and down, thereby driving a traditional generator.

The ocean waves behaviour have been the objectives for many investigations. However, apart from some tests, mechanical solutions with a traditional rotating generator (1,500 r.p.m.) have been predominant for the conversion. Most of the projects remain in the research stage, but a substantial number of plants have been deployed in the sea as demonstration schemes.

Several ways of classifying wave energy devices have been proposed, based on the energy extraction method, the size of the device and so on. A group of devices, classified as “Point Absorbers”, appears to have the approach a performance where commercial exploitation is possible.

Available Energy from the ocean

Potential Energy:  PE = mh

Kinetic Energy:  KE = ½ mv2 or ½ mu2

Wave energy is proportional to wave length times wave height squared (LH2)per wave length per unit of crest length

A four-foot (1.2 m), ten-second wave striking a coast expends more than 35, 000 HP per mile of coast 

TWO TYPES OF WAVE ENERGY CONVERTERS

1.Point absorber driven linear generator

2.Floating wave energy extractor

POINT ABSORBER DRIVEN LINEAR GENERATOR

Linear generators for wave power conversion have previously been considered but where concluded as impossible, since low velocities were believed to give too slow flux changes and thereby large and expensive electromagnetic converters. However, renewed activities has been reported from England and the Netherlands. Furthermore, recent electromagnetic simulations, revile a neglected opportunity.

We work with a concept that combines Faraday’s law of induction, Newton’s laws of motion, the even older principle of Archimedes with relative recent advancement in materials technology. In the spirit of minimizing mechanics by adapting generator to wave motion a design with a buoy absorbing ocean wave energy at the surface driving a linear generator at the sea floor

Wave energy is directly converted into electricity by a linear generator consisting of insulated conductors; NdFeB permanent magnet and steel of different quality like electroplate and construction steel. Detailed modelling and simulations, as opposed to the traditional rule of thumb estimates, with a full account of design in full physics simulation gives detailed data on performance, as illustrated in Figure 2.

The buoy, which drives the linear generator, can be built from different materials having good resistance to corrosion and which can withstand high stress caused by the ocean waves and in different forms.

However, a cylindrical shape is preferred as a uni-directional point absorber is desired. Buoy dynamics and its behaviours during ocean wave exposure have been described elsewhere. A buoy connected with a stiff rope will drive the generator piston as the wave is rising. When the wave subsides a spring that has stored energy mechanically will drive the generator. Thus allowing for generation of electricity during both up and down travel.

When the flux from the piston circumvents its coils induction will occur in the generators stator, as the piston ideally moves up and down. Dependent on several parameters, generator design, wave shape, buoy size, weight, load and springs etc., different voltages with varying frequencies will be induced in the stator windings.

For open circuit conditions, the generator AC-voltage starts at zero, when the buoy is momentarily at rest in its lowest position, increases as the buoy accelerates towards the top of the wave, where it again reaches zero as the buoy stops.

For a relatively small wave energy converter (WEC) in the regime of 10–20 kW the buoy will have a diameter of three to five meters depending on wave climate and power rating. The buoy will have a weight in the regime of a few hundred kg to one metric ton depending on size and material. The buoy is connected to the generator with a modern synthetic rope (possible of stretched polyethylene) trade names such as Dyneema and Spectra, with an optional cover for handling of fouling. A housing encloses the generator, as indicted in Figure 1. This could be made of concrete or steel with and integrated bottom concrete slab.

The total weight of the generator is in the range of a few tons whereas the bottom slab must have a weight surpassing the floatation of the buoy, in the range of 10 to 30 metric tons. The slab can be positioned directly at the bottom and kept in place by gravity.

MACHINE CONFIGURATION

General description

A possible WEC concept with a linear generator as power take-off is shown in Figure (1). The WEC consists of a buoy coupleddirectly to the rotor of a linear generator by a rope. The tension of the rope is maintained with a spring pulling the rotor downwards. The rotor will move up and down at approximately the same speed as the waves and the maximum speed will be in the order of 1 m/s. The relatively low speed implies that the reaction force developed between the rotor and stator to be very high. For example, a 10 kW generator needs a reaction force in the order of 10 kN with a rotor speed of 1 m/s. This implies that a directly driven generator must be larger than a conventional high-speed generator.

Stator

The stator is made of laminated electrical steel,piled into one solid unit, The conductors are power cables with a circular cross-section and a conducting area of 16 mm2, insulated with a 1.1 mm PVC-layer, which adds up to an outer diameter of 7.2 mm. The coil winding is a three-phase winding with a slot per pole and phase ratio of 5/4. This winding configuration aims at minimizing the fluctuation in the output power caused by cogging. A three-phase LFM with a slot per pole and phase ratio equal to one is proposed as generator in the Archimedes Wave Swing.

Rotor

Two types of magnet fixation methods, surface mounting and burying magnets between pole efficiency and low material usage is desired.The electromagnetic efficiency includes hysteresis losses, eddy current losses and resistive losses. Furthermore, a low load angle is desired. A machine with inherently low load angle has better performance at both normal and transient conditions and is less affected by changing loads and varying frequencies.The four rotor concepts are simulated for different magnet dimensions and various pole widths. Output power, voltage and stator width are held constant in the simulation and the vertical length of the rotor is iterated to fulfil these conditions. usage such as total magnet volume, stator steel

 Magnet dimensions

Different heights to width relations of the magnets have been investigated in order to seeif there is an optimum. the magnet volume of single magnet is kept constant and the electromagnetic efficiency and total magnet weight is plotted for different height to width relations of the magnets. As can be seen the electromagnetic efficiency is steadily increasing and the total magnet weight is decreasing with increasing magnet width for the surface mounted magnets. The pole width limits the magnet width and no optimum is reach for the surface mounted magnets.

Only active power is converted

From an analytical point of view, introduction of a load necessary to extract energy, poses a new challenge. The load considerably complicates the dynamics of the motion. An electrical current, from the induced voltage in the stator windings, exerts a retarding force on the piston proportional to its speed relative the stator.

Using rectifier with an externally applied DC voltage makes the dynamics even harder. Current passes the diodes when the induced voltages have higher potential than the externally applied voltage.

The retarding force is zero when the current is zero in the windings. Moreover, as induced and rectified voltage excides the applied DC voltage, a retarding force will abruptly be introduced, momentarily reducing the acceleration.

However, only active power transmitted is converted in the rectifier. Hence, the design has to be render the generator insensitive to wave and load variations. This can be accomplished by designing for a load angle close to unity. In practice, the current has to be relatively low at full load securing small variations in load angle versus open circuit.

This strategy has advantages of and widen the range of components used for conversion from stator windings to the grid connection. Simulations show that a working efficiency of around 85 per cent can be obtained.

GRID CONNECTION

In a plant a number of WEC’s are interconnected with a underwater substation (UWS) with a three-phase cable on the ocean floor. The UWS features a multi WEC connection and houses components for controlling the individual WEC’s, connecting the power to a common DC-bus and possibly equipment for transforming power before transmission to shore.

The WEC units will be connected in larger arrays ranging from tenths up to thousands of individual converters.

For an ocean with moderate wave climate, like the Baltic, four hundred 10 KW WEC could be interconnected to form a 4 MW plant . The grid connected can be implemented in various ways:

• A number of base units are connected on the DC side, and thereafter a transmission line connects the cluster to land. A converter onshore for grid connection forms a 50 or 60 Hz AC. An optional shore transformer could also include a tap changer in order to compensate  voltage variations,

• Another option, similar to the first, is to move the converter offshore which limits land use. However, this increases the complexity and may decrease the availability as maintenance will be more weather dependent. The converter can be placed on a platform or enclosed in a watertight container on the seabed. 

• A further development would be to also install a transformer offshore. This would increase power transmission possibilities since power is proportional to the square of the voltage, i.e. for the same power rating the current is lower with higher transmission voltage.

• A fourth option includes a high voltage DC “HVDC” transmission link. This implies a higher degree of complexity, but transmission losses are kept at a minimum. However, the power components losses will be added. A platform or watertight enclosure is also required for the electrical power components.

Wave regeneration

In a system where a number of WEC-arrays are deployed over an ocean surface the “up wave” arrays will shadow the ones behind them, when there is a predominant wave direction in the same sense as the buoys instead the individual array as discussed,. However, this additional shadowing effect can be avoided through an ample distance between arrays, for regeneration of waves by the action of the wind. If the arrays are placed in straight rows perpendicular to a constant wind direction, as shown in Fig. 2a, the necessary distances for wave regeneration can be calculated using a relation between the significant wave height, Hs, the wind speed, V, and the length of the fetch. A parameterisation of this relation yields,

For a rectangular wave power plant, where the arrays are ordered side by side in long rows, as absorption by each buoy, a row of arrays willabsorb 26% of the energy coming in over its width. This corresponds to a 14% attenuation of the wave height, neglecting array effects on wave period. An initial significant wave height of 2 m, will thus be reduced to 1.7 m immediately behind the row.

  

For awind speed of 10 m/s the required fetch to achieve 2 m waves from plane water is, in deep waters, 190 km. The corresponding fetch for a significant wave

height of 1.7 m is 130 km. Thus, the attenuated waves need an inter-row distance dr = 60 km, to recover their initial wave height. With an array diameter of 600 m, this array arrangement will correspond to a wave regeneration area of 36 km2 per array. An ocean area is a continuous absorber of wind energy. The regeneration area per array is not expected to differ substantially when array distribution is changed, due to wave diffraction. In order to achieve an absorption independent of the wave direction, the arrays can be configured into a hexagonal pattern as indicated in Fig. 2b. The constraint of a wave regeneration area of 36 km2 per array yields a nearest neighbour distance of dnn=6.5 km.

Floating wave energy extractor

Another variation of a wavee energy converter, which uses the vertically exerted force of a wave ,is a Floating wave energy extractor

About the technology: The floating wave energy extractor is also a method for the maximum exploitation of the wave energy and it is designed for distant offshore with very unstable sea surface. The system is consists of a rectangular shaped huge mass floating body supported by a large number of floating air columns. The air column’s extensions are connected to pistons. The pistons are placed its own cylinders and it can move up and down through the cylinders when the floating air columns moves with the up-down movements of the waves. The upper side of the cylinders has two valves. One to a high-pressure fluid pipe and it will open when the floating air column on crest. One valve is to the low-pressure fluid pipe and it will open when the floating air column on the trough. The whole system is anchored to the sea bottom. 

Working:

When the wave moves through the floating air columns, it to oscillate the floating air columns. When some of the air columns (air columns that on the crest) move upward, the whole weight of the floating system will be supported through that air columns. Also, now some floating air columns (the air columns that on the trough) will move downward. As some of the air columns move upward, the pistons of those air columns to pressurize its corresponding cylinders and the hydraulic fluid inside of the cylinders rush to the high-pressure fluid pipe with high pressure (now the valves to the low-pressure fluid pipe will be closed). Since the whole of the high-pressure fluid pipes are interconnected, the net pressure will focus on the turbine and the turbine will rotate. As the floating air columns that on the trough move down ward because of the gravity, the valves to the high-pressure fluid pipe will be closed and the valves to the low-pressure fluid pipe (the low-pressure fluid pipes are also interconnected) will be open. Now the low-pressure fluid will enter to the cylinders and will be filled. As the turbine rotate, the generator connected to the turbine generate electricity.

Unique features:

 Even though the floating huge weight has a large number of floating supports on the sea, at a single moment it will be supported by only a few number of supporting pistons shafts that of the floating air columns on the crests. The net hydraulic fluid pressure exerted on the turbine will be almost equal to the weight of the floating huge weight. Since the floating power plant system is not required any ground based supports, it can be installed anywhere there is sufficient waves are present regardless of the depth of the sea. In effect, the floating air columns and its associated machineries absorb most of the wave energy that present on the sea surface and additionally, the system requires no directional waves. Because of these features, it can be placed any where there is sufficient waves are present. Since the system is placed on distant offshore, the wiring of the electric cable to the shore may be difficult. It is suggested that, the floating wave energy extractor can be used to generate hydrogen in large scale in far distant offshore with violent (but affordable) sea surfaces.

Other potential applications of the floating system: The offshore floating platform can be used for many useful purposes. 

Some of the attractiveness of floating wave energy extractor technology:

a) The floating wave energy extractor is designed for offshore. Since the offshore wave energy is greater than onshore waves, it can deliver considerable greater power.

b) Since it is not depended on the geographical structures, it can be constructed anywhere there is sufficient waves are present.

c) It will not case any major nature impact.

d) The whole of the system can be constructed in an onshore factory and the floating system can easily transport to the ideal places with the help of a simple pulling boat.

e) The all corrosive parts of the system like turbine, pistons etc are completely separated from the contact of the saline water, the risk of the corrosion can be minimized.

f) Since the system is just floating on the sea surface, the tidal activities will not cause any operational problems. 

CONCLUSION

Waves  represent one of the most densely powered natural fluxes which can be directly used for renewable energy generation.

Furthermore, it can have a relatively large utilisation time as the power flux variations are attenuated when the waves are induced by winds which in turn originates from solar power.in this present scenario of unjudicious use of natural resourses wave energy will defenitly play an important role in accounting for the future energy needs.