Page 33 - European Energy Innovation magazine - spring 2023 edition

Winter 2022 European Energy Innovation
COMMUNICATION 33

he negative effects of
climate change have been
broadly demonstrated and
Trenewable, carbon-free
energy has proved to be one of the
most important keys – if not the
most – to achieve the transition
that will halt human-induced
global warming. The effort is well
worth it, as there are a number of
generation technologies that have Figure: Shared anchors study
been developed in the last decades
capable of accomplishing the
environmental targets established cost benefit as the anchors cost is and restrictions such as minimum
by governments and other global reduced but the mooring lines cost distance to shore or avoiding mooring
institutions to fight against climate increases. However, the analysis of line crossings are ensured.
change. Nevertheless, analysing the shared mooring lines lead to large
evolution of the implementation of costs reduction. The different improvements
these technologies unveils that the developed by the partners have
time factor is critical and that a slow- Another potential innovation to not been limited to ideas and
paced change will not meet such further reduce the LCOE of the calculations. Instead, a validation
targets, compromising the well-being floating wind farms have been campaign has been conducted to
of future generations. studied by optimising their layout. verify the materials behaviour in real
Instead of following a regular conditions, as well as the integrated
COREWIND is the European project distribution of the wind turbines behaviour of two substructure
that began in this context – back in in the site, a PSO (Particle Swarm concepts – ActiveFloat and WindCrete
2019 – to extend the applicability, Optimisation) has been applied – together with their mooring lines
reduce the costs and bring closer the to position the wind farm assets and dynamic cables in a wave basin.
commissioning of utility-scale plants (offshore substations included),
of one on these technologies: floating achieving reductions up to a 5% of These and additional studies and
offshore wind. Its implementation the LCOE compared to the base improvements are being developed in
unlocks vast areas where wind energy cases with regular distributions. COREWIND, which will be quantified
could be generated around the globe together in the first half of next year
with low impact on both human The reliability of the results to measure their impact. In all, the
activities and the environment. is deemed critical, therefore project is advancing successfully,
Finishing next year, the project is an accurate model has been delivering high-quality insights to
in an advanced state already with implemented; among others, power the sector and providing a sustained
some results leading to its main goal: losses are calculated by means of boost required by the technology
reducing the LCOE (Levelised Cost power flows following IEC standards, in order to achieve the ambitious
Of Energy) of the technology, while the site bathymetry is considered to environmental targets we need to
maintaining a low environmental modify the mooring system costs stop global warming. l
impact.

An example of the innovations This project has received funding from the European
conducted by the consortium are Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme
the shared anchors and shared under grant agreement No 815083.
mooring lines studies. As opposed
to a conventional wind farm design
where each turbine is moored
independently, these studies aim
at sharing certain components of
adjacent units to reduce the cost of
the system. The technical feasibility
of a farm with shared anchors
has been proved, but with limited

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Figure: Layout optimization