Offshore staff
OAKLAND, CA – CalWave says that it has successfully concluded its open-ocean wave energy pilot after 10 months of continuous operation off the coast of San Diego.
The project, which deployed in September 2021, was supported by a US Department of Energy award with the goal to demonstrate CalWave’s scalable and patented xWave technology as a cost-effective, sustainable solution for energy generation.
Not only does the demonstration represent California’s first at-sea, long-duration wave energy project, but CalWave says that it also serves as a critical step toward proving wave power as a commercially viable renewable resource.
The pilot device, named x1, has now been recovered and decommissioned. Findings will be used to inform CalWave’s next grid-connected deployment, scheduled to occur at the federally-approved, 20-MW PacWave wave energy test site off the coast of Newport, Oregon.
CalWave says that wave energy has been assessed by experts as capable of supplying upwards of a third of global energy demand, yet the development of a viable technology capable of reliably withstanding harsh ocean conditions has been slow to evolve, until now.
09.06.2022
