The UK tidal sector has recently achieved remarkable progress, including deploying the first two arrays of tidal turbines (Nova Innovation and MeyGen) and deploying the world’s largest twin-rotor f
As part of its wide-ranging and multi-disciplinary research portfolio in renewable energy, IES operates the FloWave Ocean Energy Research Facility, a £12M, state-of-the-art, circular wave and current basin. FloWave is a globally unique test-bed for marine energy devices and for fundamental studies of multi-directional wave and wave current interactions. The successful candidate will have a track record of excellent research in one or more of the following topics: non-linear wave hydrodynamics, wave-current interaction, ocean wave/current statistics, marine energy devices, ship manoeuvrability, floating platforms, offshore fluid-structure interaction, and mooring dynamics. In due course, the successful candidate will undertake teaching duties in Mechanical Engineering.
Based within the leading UK offshore energy research Universities and Institutes, the IDCORE programme trains world-class industrially focussed research engineers who will, with the help of sponsoring companies, accelerate the deployment of offshore wind, wave and tidal-current technologies in order to meet the UK's ambitious offshore renewable energy targets.
The aim of the RealTide project is to identify main failure causes of tidal turbines at sea and to provide a step change in the design of key components, namely the blades and power take-off systems, adapting them more accurately to the complex environmental tidal conditions. Advanced monitoring systems will be integrated with these identified sub-systems and together with maintenance strategies will be implemented at outset from the design stage to achieve an increased reliability and improved performance over the full tidal turbine life.
