Next Generation Marine Materials for Resilient Offshore Renewable Energy Devices

While innovative offshore renewable energy device technologies are gaining popularity, operating them in harsh marine environment is a complex and challenging process that jeopardizes the deployment of these very important technologies for the future generations. Wave Energy Conversion (WEC) devices are dynamic structures with components exposed to multiple loads and degradation mechanisms that are acting together, therefore subjected to multi-degradation mechanisms that are neither not always well understood nor the synergistic effects are considered. This lack of fundamental knowledge and lack of lab testing capable of simulating the complex multidegradation mechanisms are one of the main reasons that are slowing the development and implementation of WEC devices. MORE (Next Generation Marine Materials for Resilient Offshore Renewable Energy Devices) proposes the creation of a new robust methodology with improved tools for material selection and validation to harmonize testing procedures capable of generating the next generation of materials for Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) devices, to overcome the present energy and environmental challenges. This will be achieved by considering tribocorrosion (wear accelerated by corrosion) and multi-degradation (tribocorrosion accelerated by fatigue) in a field highly affected by these degradation mechanisms. The novelty of the MORE project is based on the harmonizing small- and large-scale multi-degradation rigs, to create a fast track for validation of materials, to enable the industrial uptake of these methods and improve the systems’ reliability and lifetime. MORE will demonstrate a multi-degradation validation pathway for materials and subcomponents to be used as a case study in the offshore renewable energy sector.

MORE (Next Generation Marine Materials for Resilient Offshore Renewable Energy Devices) proposes the creation of a new robust methodology with improved tools for material selection and validation to harmonize testing procedures capable of generating the next generation of materials for Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) devices, to overcome the present energy and environmental challenges. This will be achieved by considering tribocorrosion (wear accelerated by corrosion) and multi-degradation (tribocorrosion accelerated by fatigue) in a field highly affected by these degradation mechanisms. This is a brand-new material selection methodology for the renewable energy sector compared to the current incomplete conventional material selection and validation process (DNV Guidelines1). This project will allow the offshore renewable energy sector to reach their milestones in a more resilient and realistic way, giving it an edge against its current fossil fuel competitors like the Oil and Gas (O&G) sector. MORE’s methodology incorporates the functionality of small-scale testing, up to scaled-up devices. This approach is expected to contribute significantly to directly solving the ORE sector's challenges, making a step change improvement in the reliability, performance, lifetime predictability and longevity of their equipment.