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Three projects to share €300K to advance offshore floating solar sector Three project consortia in the Netherlands – involving technology developers Oceans of Energy and SolarDuck – have been selected to receive €100,000 each to further advance offshore floating solar industry in the Netherlands. The announcement follows innovation call, launched by TKI Wind op Zee together with TKI Urban Energy back in October 2021, to support organizations in exploring research and innovations in floating solar energy.
Three project consortia have been selected to receive €100,000 each, bringing together SolarDuck and TNO in the BOC project, Deltares and Oceans of Energy for the CeFlar project, and MARIN and SolarDuck in the WindForce project. SolarDuck has recently successfully commissioned its first offshore floating solar prototype. However,
large OFPV assemblies of more than 10MWp is the target and this requires an upgrade of the connections to cope with the high waves and high winds. TNO and SolarDuck will therefore jointly develop a robust coupling in this research that has both resilient and damping properties. During the research, the spring/ damper characteristics will be deter-
mined under various conditions on the basis of really large tests at TNO. The calculation method to be developed will be validated on the basis of this. This is expected to result in a significant reduction in peak loads and vibration levels. This can be beneficial in reducing the mass and costs of the coupling and construction of offshore floating solar installations.
