im Maßstab 1:8 The University of Maine Composites Center and partners today gathered in Brewer, Maine, to launch the first gird-connected offshore wind turbine off the coast of North America. The DeepCWind consortium placed in the water a 65-foot-tall prototype turbine atop a floating semi-submersible concrete foundation. The structure is 1:8th the scale of a 6MW 423-foot rotor diameter design. The demonstrator carries a 20kW Renewegy turbine. This weekend the prototype will be towed from Brewer down the Penobscot River out to the Gulf of Maine, where it will be moored just off of Dyce Head in Castine. The VolturnUS turbine will then be connected to the power grid on 3 June. The machine will remain in place for 30 days. It will then be towed to a site off Monhegan. Data acquired during the 2013 deployments will be used to optimize the design of UMaine’s VolturnUS system. The research project is the first phase in a 12MW $96m pilot wind farm. The deployments this summer will help de-risk UMaine’s VolturnUS technology in preparation for connecting the first full-scale unit to the grid in 2016. The program goal is to reduce the cost of offshore wind to 10 cents/kWh by 2020 to compete with other forms of electricity generation without subsidies. The DeepCwind research program is a public-private partnership funded by the US Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation-Partners for Innovation, the Maine Technology Institute, the state of Maine, the University of Maine and more than 30 industry partners.
Quelle:http://renews.biz/42895/volturnus-dips-toe-in-water/
Man darf gespannt sein ;-)