Building on its mission to decarbonise Australia’s Blue Economy through accelerated commercialisation of ocean energy, AOEG works to facilitate alignment between ocean energy technology providers with markets (‘end-users’).
The adoption of ocean energy helps diversify an end-user’s energy mix, reduce dependence on fossil fuels and increase operational sustainability.
Furthermore, ocean energy creates economic opportunities, provides environmental benefits, drives technological advancements, fosters knowledge and expertise, and contributes to global climate change mitigation efforts.
View the latest innovations from our network below.
Key Projects
Ocean energy, also known as marine energy, encompasses engineering technologies, such as tidal and wave devices, that harness the movements of the ocean to create electricity and/or potable water. Such developments are not new. In fact, the first ocean energy technologies were developed over 100 years ago, which leads to the key question of why aren’t ocean energy technologies fully commercialised after all this time? The answer is cost.
The cost of producing electricity by wave technologies, otherwise referred to as ‘wave energy converters’ (WECs), is influenced by how efficiently an individual device operates. The goal is to maximise the amount of energy captured and converted from the ocean environment per unit cost.
In a dedicated research project, a team from the University of Western Australia (UWA) and CorPower Ocean (CPO) is tackling WEC performance improvements through development of novel efficient numerical models to more accurately represent the forces that waves exert on WECs. Combining hydrodynamic research expertise and detailed insight into full-scale WEC operational principles, the project looks to drive down the cost of wave energy facilitating growth and utilisation of WEC technologies.
As various sectors of the global aquaculture industry, such as the salmon industry, move operations further offshore, the sector is encountering new challenges to access clean and reliable energy. These challenges can vary depending on the specific offshore activities and their duration.
Carnegie’s MoorPower® technology delivers a pioneering solution to the energy needs required by the aquaculture industry to move further offshore. By reducing reliance on diesel generators and associated emissions, MoorPower can provide essential electricity for feeding barges, lighting, and other operations.
MoorPower showcases the potential of wave energy as a sustainable solution, opening up new market opportunities in this nascent industry.
Australia’s Aquaculture sector is in a period of disruption, diversification, and growth. Marine based aquaculture operators are predominately reliant on diesel generation, while shore-based facilities like hatcheries, recirculating aquaculture systems and processing facilities use increasingly volatile and expensive grid supplied electricity, typically with diesel powered backup. With increasing regulatory, stakeholder, and market pressures to respond to sustainability issues, the Aquaculture sector is being required to investigate solutions to these pressures.
This innovative project explores the feasibility of an ocean energy microgrid as one potential solution.
The University of Western Australia’s Wave Energy Research Centre, with headquarters in Albany, is leading the Au$4.8 million ($3.5 million) marine innovation project on the Great Southern coast.
The project – nicknamed M4 and short for ‘Moored MultiModal Multibody’ – is jointly supported by the Western Australian Government and the Blue Economy CRC.
The name M4 describes the wave attenuator technology developed by the Wave Energy Research Centre’s long-standing collaborators at the University of Manchester in UK.
The name M4 describes the wave attenuator technology developed by the Wave Energy Research Centre’s long-standing collaborators at the University of Manchester in UK.
By deploying a small prototype M4, studded with scientific instruments and sensors, in Albany’s outer harbour at King George Sound for several months, the University of Western Australia’s research teams at the Albany and Perth campuses will learn how this technology performs in various ocean conditions and how it could supply clean energy to nearby aquaculture operations.