Standards
In addition to its services for developers of devices, the European Marine Energy Centre is facilitating and coordinating the development of standards, on behalf of the marine renewable energy industry. This is in line with EMEC’s Mission to encourage and stimulate the development of the industry. For an introduction to some of the benefits of standardisation and the process of producing standards please visit the website of BSI British Standards.
One of the key tasks is to engage the industry in the task of developing these draft documents, and to make sure that wide consultation takes place on the documents. This will include colleagues in Europe through the International Energy Agency group on Ocean Energy Systems (IEA-OES).As well as performance standards, future work will include the development of standards for design, engineering, manufacturing and safety. A programme has been agreed upon, funded by the Department of Trade and Industry and the Scottish Government for the following draft standards:
- Wave Performance Testing
- Tank Testing
- Tidal Performance Testing
- Environmental Impact Guide
- Wave Resource Assessment
- Project Development
- Grid Interface
- Design Basis
- Reliability, Maintainability, and Survivability
- Health and Safety Guide
- Tidal Resource Assessment
- Manufacture and Factory Testing
- Independent Verification and Validation of Ocean Energy
These are the documents that UK and European industry members have agreed should be the starting point for this task of producing working drafts.
Some of these will be submitted through BSI British Standards to the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) as draft International Standards. A new Technical Committee (TC114) is being formed to progress international standards for Ocean Energy. An “Ad Hoc Work Group” has been formed to become the UK “mirror” committee (PEL114). This latter committee will oversee the development of UK draft standards on behalf of the industry.Each document will be progressed by a small working group with individuals representing technology developers, regulators, academe, utilities, and project developers – a true cross-section of the marine energy industry.
In 2004 EMEC launched the first draft standard assessment for testing Performance of Wave Energy Converter systems in the open sea. This sets out how to characterise an area of the sea in terms of its energy levels in the waves and use this along with electrical power measurement to assess device performance. The standard provides a uniform methodology to ensure consistency and stated accuracy in the measurement and analysis of the performance of wave energy conversion systems. The draft standard now requires updating and alignment with other relevant documents produced more recently that inform some aspects of the standard.EMEC will provide administrative support and co-ordination for this task in a work programme that stretches over about 18 months. Contact Andrew Want at EMEC for information.
Timeline for Standards Development:
Some of the documents are expected to go forward as draft International
Standards.
The Standards Project is being led on EMEC's behalf by John Griffiths. John
is a non-Executive Director of EMEC and acts as our Technical Director. He
has responsibility within the Board for the company's management systems
(Health & Safety; Environmental Management and QA) The QA aspect
includes our programme for accreditation under ISO 17025 - the Standard for
Measurement Laboratories for which we are registered with UKAS as our Accreditation
Body and who effectively independently survey and audit all our key activities.
John spends about 20 - 25% of his time on EMEC business as required. He acts
as EMEC's technical advisor on complex technical or safety issues.
John was the co-ordinating author of the first Draft Standard on "Performance Measurement of Wave Energy Converters in the Open Sea" and has been closely involved in the design and development of the EMEC facilities since inception. He has been consulting in marine renewables since 1999.
John is a Chemical Engineer by training, and before getting involved in Marine renewable energy, spent more than 30 years in the oil & gas industry in roles from gas manufacture, through transmission and pipeline system maintenance to engineering and development of offshore projects. He was responsible for offshore operations in the British Gas E&P companies in the formative years of offshore development and has worked at senior levels in a number of Oil & Gas Contracting Companies, such as Matthew Hall, AMEC and Bechtel.