US wave developer Ocean Power Technologies is to license its APB350 PowerBuoy device to Mitsui Engineering and Shipbuilding for a project off the coast of Japan.
The New Jersey-based company has entered into a letter of intent with Mitsui to conduct funded ‘pre-work tasks’ and to negotiate a definitive agreement that would allow for the lease of the APB350 PowerBuoy for the project off Kozu island.
Initial engineering tasks will start this month with PowerBuoy shipment to Japan and deployment expected in 2017.
The OPT project scope includes deployment planning and logistics, ocean performance data collection and processing.
OPT and Mitsui will jointly develop and test an advanced control algorithm with the goal of assessing increasing ocean wave capture and power generation.
Mitusi renewable energy project head Toshihiko Maemura said: “We would like to assure that this project will prove a high ability of our advanced control algorithm for state of calm sea off Kozu.”
“We are excited to support MES’s ocean project with our advanced APB350 PowerBuoy by providing a power and communications platform specific to Japanese conditions and applications,” said OPT chief executive George Kirby.
“We are looking forward to working closely with MES to enable new and existing applications on a global scale,” he added.
Image: PowerBuoy wave device (OPT)
