An Atlas of the Wave-Energy Resource in Europe

Abstract

An atlas of the European offshore wave energy resource, being developed within the scope of a European R&D program, includes the characterization of the offshore resource for the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts of Europe in addition to providing wave-energy and wave-climate statistics that are of interest to other users of the ocean. The wave data used for compiling the Atlas come from the numerical wind-wave model WAM, implemented in the routine operation of the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), in addition to directional wave measurements from the Norwegian offshore waters.

Wave Energy Resource Assessment off the Coast of China around the Zhoushan Islands

“…This formula has been widely adopted [5][6][7]10,11,24,30] and has high accuracy, which can reduce the computational efforts.…”

“…Equation (6) shows that the mean wave power density in the minimum energy month is closer to the annual mean wave power density when ST is higher, indicating less variation in the wave power density. Under this circumstance, the wave energy is more stable and sustainable.…”

“…Zheng et al [5] evaluated the wind wave energy and swell energy for global oceans in detail based on global wind wave fields and swell fields from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) ERA-40 reanalysis data over the last 45 years. Pontes et al [6] and Pontes [7] evaluated the wave energy in Europe's coastal waters in the Atlantic and Mediterranean by using the wave model Wave Modelling project (WAM). Soares et al [8] assessed the wave energy in detail along the Atlantic European coast by using WAVEWATCH-III and Simulating Waves Nearshore (SWAN).…”

Wave Energy Assessment and Performance Estimation of State of the Art Wave Energy Converters in Italian Hotspots

“…In the case of Mediterranean Sea, the first assessment of the offshore wave energy was developed in 1996 [13] pointing out wave power values close to 1 kW/m in the northern area of the Adriatic Sea, and 6 kW/m off the western area of Sardinia and Sicily Italian islands. In 2004, the interest on the Mediterranean Sea started to increase when a consortium of six companies published a wave power atlas [14], with spatial resolution of about 50 km, showing offshore wave potentials in the range between 0.75 kW/m in the northern area of the Adriatic Sea and 14.75 kW/m in the western area of Sardinia and Corsica islands [15].…”

“…Traditionally, the assessment of the wave energy has been carried out for offshore deep water wave data [1,[4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19], while, more recently, coastal areas have been investigated in order to locate hotspots [20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37]. At the oceanic global scale, the richest wave power areas are between 40 • and 60 • latitude of both hemispheres [10].…”