IEC have are establishing a new committee, TC 114, Marine Energy – Wave and Tidal Energy Converters, to develop International Standards for wave and tidal energy technology that will help establish this promising source of renewable energy as a competitive form of electrical energy production.
Standards that will be developed by the new grouping of experts will cover the performance of tidal and wave energy converters, how these converters will plug into electricity grid systems, and how they should be tested.
Tidal or ocean energy devices are either floating or fixed and, to generate electrical energy, they tend either to oscillate or to rotate. Research on this technology started in Japan in the 1940s. While there has been limited use since the 1970s, functioning units have been in use in various countries since the 1990s, mostly as prototypes.
Click here for more details on the background to this development.
