MANY MINDEDWave energy converter clears full safety certification for the first time
CorPower Ocean's C4 wave energy buoy earned a full certificate from Norwegian classification firm DNV, described as the first such certificate for a wave energy converter. The seven-year review covered design, structural fatigue, manufacturing, and storm survival. The teardrop-shaped buoy is 9 meters wide, 18 meters tall, and weighs around 100 tonnes.
The buoy is tethered to the seabed by a tensioned cable and drives a generator through its up-and-down motion. Its WaveSpring phase-control system amplifies a 1-meter wave to move the buoy up to 3 meters. A prototype has run off Aguçadoura in northern Portugal since 2023, sitting 4 km offshore at a seabed depth of 45 meters. During Storm Domingos in November 2023 it survived an 18.5-meter wave, as logged by Portugal's Hydrographic Institute.
Wave power has been sidelined for decades in part because devices could not credibly prove they would survive the ocean or satisfy insurers and financiers. A recognized safety certificate lowers that barrier, making projects financeable. Waves are more constant than sun or wind, so a reliable converter could add a steadier renewable to the mix — one that helps balance grids and, in time, lowers the cost of clean electricity.
The commercial plan clusters dozens of buoys into arrays called CorPacks producing hundreds of megawatts, with first commercial-scale arrays in Portugal and Scotland expected online between 2027 and 2029. Commercial performance remains unproven, and the grid-balancing benefits are stated expectations rather than results demonstrated at scale.
Source: New Atlas