SEATTLE, Wash. /CitizenWire/ — Oscilla Power, Inc. [OPI] is proud to announce the receipt of a $200k Phase I SBIR grant award from the US Department of Energy to develop a wave energy powered platform for ocean sensing and monitoring systems. This award will help to develop technology that enables offshore instrumentation payloads to be powered by renewable energy from the surrounding ocean waves.
During this work OPI will collaborate with CODAR Ocean Sensors, an expert in high-frequency (HF) radar monitoring, to develop a wave-powered instrumentation platform for an offshore HF radar package. Such a system has the potential to greatly expand the range of existing shore-based environmental monitoring.
During this 9-month project, OPI will work with researchers at ECU’s Coastal Studies Institute and Oregon State University to develop the marine platform using state-of-the-art optimization algorithms inspired by nature.
There are currently over 8,000 ocean monitoring platforms deployed world-wide, yet the global oceanographic monitoring system market is still considered to be in its infancy. Existing buoys and sensor platforms either utilize solar panels or disposable batteries, both of which need regular servicing visits. By harnessing energy from ocean waves, these servicing visits can be reduced to near zero, along with the associated waste and carbon emissions.
According to Balky Nair, President of Oscilla Power, “This is a great opportunity for OPI to showcase our technology and create a paradigm shift in the in the way ocean instrumentation will be powered in the future.”
If this early work is successful, OPI plans to continue to work with project partners to progress into a full ocean demonstration in 2023. While the marine platform will be developed specifically for CODAR during the project, this R&D will lay the groundwork for a variety of ocean sensor systems.
About Oscilla Power Inc.:
Oscilla Power Inc. is developing advanced technology to extract energy from ocean waves. In addition to the work described here, they are currently completing the construction of the Triton-C prototype, a 100kW wave energy converter that is expected to be tested in Hawaii next year.
Learn more at: https://www.oscillapower.com/
Learn More: https://oscillapower.com/
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