Where Blue Turns Green
Intended to be located off the breakwaters, our solution produces clean wave energy.
It consists of two cells sliding against one another, the upper one floating on the surface and the lower one semi-submerged, the whole system being connected to a ground station storing energy in a momentum wheel.
The system captures both the relative displacement of the two cells by the action of the swell, as well as the displacement of the cells relative to the ground station, thus generating much larger amounts of energy compared to traditional swell-based solutions.
Possible Applications
Electricity Generation
The continuous production of green electricity is the most obvious use. The momentum wheel acts as a gauge that discharges at a constant rate (as the generator transforms energy) and recharges irregularly with the swell.
Deep Discharge Battery
Controlled braking of the flywheel produces a large amount of energy in a short period of time. Such a process can act as a fast-discharging battery, for example in mixed wind/gas systems to allow the transition between the intermittent drops of wind power and the start-up delays of natural gas.
Water Desalination
In the case of desalination, the system can directly pump water through reverse osmosis membranes without the need for energy conversion (and therefore conversion losses). The presence of the system in the marine environment is also an advantage.