Wave energy expert describes project to Yachats audience

By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com

If OSU builds it, will they come?

Burke Hales and Oregon State University are betting $50 million in federal and state money that someone will.

Hales is chief scientist for PacWave, an OSU-led consortium planning to install a wave-energy testing system stretching from seven miles west of Newport to a research center just north of Seal Rock.

Hales spoke Sunday to an audience of 75 people at the monthly meeting of the Yachats Academy of Arts and Sciences, outlining the eight-year-old project that he hopes will be operational in two years.

If the project is to proceed on schedule, Hales said, it faces a “go/no go” decision in October. That decision hinges on getting a final permit from the U.S. Department of Energy, gaining commitments of more funding and from energy producers to conduct tests.

“It’s not a wave energy project anymore, it’s an infrastructure project,” he told the group.

If all goes as planned, the first wave-energy device could be “in the water” two years later, he said, and energy companies come in, attach their devices for a year, study the results and leave.

Scientists have been trying for decades to harness the ocean’s power. There have been failed ideas of water-based wind turbines and tests – including off the Oregon coast – using buoys to generate electricity. The only viable wave energy system operating now is off the coast of Scotland — but some in the  U.S. Department of Energy believe that waves off the Oregon coast may offer more promise.

But since 2011 OSU scientists have been dreaming and working to set up a test site off the Oregon coast. Once established, companies interested in seeing if their wave energy devices work would hook up their units to PacWave’s ready-to-operate grid and then study the results.

“We’re not developing the wave energy ourselves,” Hales said in an OSU news release announcing the Seal Rock land purchase last summer. “We are providing the testing facilities and accreditation for the people in the business.”

PacWave — a new name for a longtime OSU-led consortium — has been using a mobile wave energy testing device since 2012 that it places in the ocean two miles off Yaquina Head, allowing private industry or academic researchers to test or study wave energy technology. Called the Ocean Sentinal, it’s currently in dry dock in Toledo.

PacWave is ready to submit documents for final federal permits to establish a 1-by-2 mile testing area seven miles west of the Newport airport. Scientists worked with the Newport-based fleet to find an area not used much for commercial fishing.

“The acceptance we found in the Newport marine community was extremely supportive,” Hales said. “They were really pro-active in helping us pick a site.”

Wave energy devices would not be visible from the shore. The testing area would be divided into four sections each with the capability of connecting five electricity-generating devices to an underground cable 260 feet below the surface.

The cable would be buried 3-6 feet in the ocean floor and run seven miles southwest, coming ashore at Driftwood Beach State Recreation Site north of Seal Rock. From there, the buried cables would go farther south to a testing facility being built on a former Christmas tree farm on the east side of Highway 101.

Starting in February 2020, PacWave will use a portion of the Driftwood Beach parking lot to connect the sea cable with cables leading to the test facility. It will start construction on the Seal Rock test facility this fall and be finished in the summer of 2020, Hales said.

Initial costs of the project were estimated to be $50 million. But Hales said Sunday that’s now too low. “It’s going to cost more money,” he said.

PacWave received a $40 million federal grant in 2016 for the project, but $35 million that won’t be released until the consortium gets contributions of at least $10 million more and decides this fall if it can proceed as planned.

The state of Oregon and OSU have committed to raising $10 million, the state so far allocating $3.8 million and OSU $3 million. OSU is trying to raise money through its foundation and Hales said PacWave continues to seek financial help, especially from research companies which might use the project.

Hales said there are 24 companies around the world exploring wave energy, some of whom could be interested in the PacWave grid. An Irish company is currently contracting with a ship builder in Portland to construct its device.

At full capacity the test site could generate 20 megawatts of power, Hales said, and will be hooked into the electrical grid of the Central Lincoln Public Utility District. But it’s not likely to be a part of a commercial electrical system because its cost will be 20 times higher.

“It’s a test site,” he said. “We are where wind energy was 20 years ago. Your power is not going to get cheaper because we plug into Central Lincoln PUD.”

Hales said researchers will monitor the area to avoid, minimize or mitigate any environmental effects. Buoys with navigational lights will mark the test area’s borders. And the cables are large enough that they should not endanger migrating whales, which are more likely to get caught in much thinner crab pot ropes, said Hales.

“You don’t put anything into the environment without the environment doing something to react,” Hales said. “But we’re doing everything to minimize that.”