In 2016, a few young engineers competed to make the most efficient wave energy device
to create clean, renewable energy from ocean waves.
Beating 90 other teams, their technology took second.
But that's just the start of this team's story.
With their winnings from the U.S. Department of Energy's or DOE's Wave Energy Prize, the
team gave themselves a name, CalWave, and kept working.
Eventually, they invented a new kind of wave energy architecture, dubbed xWave-the bones
to build smaller or larger machines to generate varying amounts of energy.
Now, with help from DOE's Water Power Technologies Office, CalWave is taking their xWave architecture
to the ocean.
As of September 2021, CalWave achieved their first xWave deployment, calling it the x1.
Deployed off the coast of San Diego, it's also California's first open-ocean, long duration
wave energy pilot project.
"The device is really revolutionary in a couple of aspects, first of which is that it's operating
fully submerged underneath the water surface, and that really allows the device to absorb
energy from multiple degrees of freedom."
CalWave's device converts wave energy into electricity.
During its 6-month test run off the Scripps Institute of Oceanography's research pier,
the company will collect data on how well their technology performs at sea.
While wave energy technologies are still young, architecture like the xWave could soon help
power the blue economy-including offshore work like marine research, fishing, and military
missions-or even supply whole towns with clean energy from ocean waves.
Open ocean trials are a huge, vital step.
But more work must be done.
"We saw that there's an enormous gap... that we don't have the technology yet to harness
all that unused wave power, and so that's really the main mission for us to unlock the
enormous resource.
Our patented architecture called the xWave operates fully submerged and allows us to
shelter from storms and being invisible from the surface.
Our technology is highly efficient and produces power just like an electric vehicle that charges
its battery when it goes down a hill."
So far, CalWave's xWave has operated near non-stop since mid-September, powering through
the site's largest storm in the last 10 years.
While storms can create powerful waves, these are often too aggressive to be harnessed for
energy production.
So, instead of trying to fight through, the xWave technology lowers beneath the surface
out of harm's way.
"This open ocean test was so important for us to really make sure that everything is
coming together.
This is a novel system, so it has different parts of it.
But to prove the entire project as a whole that we can install it, we can operate it,
it achieves the performance as intended."
This novel system was built with inspiration from wind energy research, technology, and
manufacturing.
More importantly, the device wasn't alone in the water.
To gather data on how wave energy technology might impact marine ecosystems, CalWave collaborated
with environmental monitoring experts from Integral Consulting, Inc. and Pacific Northwest
National Laboratory.
In November 2021, they installed their sound detection technology, called NoiseSpotter,
near the x1 to characterize its sound emissions and the surrounding soundscape.
Collaborations like this can help ensure future marine energy devices have minimal environmental
impacts.
This project marks an important step for CalWave, but it's far from the end of the journey.
The company is working on a larger, highly efficient 100-kilowatt wave energy device
that they plan to test at PacWave South, the first accredited, grid-connected, pre-permitted,
open-water wave energy test site in the United States.
But their most ambitious goal is grander and far more urgent:
"Global energy consumption is projected to grow by nearly 50 percent in the next 20 years.
And as we're running out of carbon budget, we need to act now to fill the gaps where
existing renewable resources fall short.
By unlocking the power of ocean waves, we can secure the last 30 percent of global energy
demand in a sustainable way and even reverse climate change."
"This successful demonstration of a wave energy conversion device in ocean is a major milestone
for unlocking the potential of wave energy from our oceans and providing access to clean
energy for the growing blue economy."
Learn more at energy.gov/eere/water & calwave.energy.