Bankable marine energy projects

MET-CERTIFIED is an Interreg 2 Seas project under the programme priority “Low carbon technologies”. It aims to increase the adoption of insurable and therefore bankable marine energy projects in the 2 Seas region through the development of internationally recognised standards and certification schemes in the sector.

MET-CERTIFIED brings together partners from 4 European countries to advance the marine energy sector in the 2 Seas region: Dutch Marine Energy Center (NL) as project coordinator, the European Marine Energy Center (UK), DNV (UK), IFREMER (FR), Tocardo Tidal Power (NL), Perpetuus Tidal Energy Centre (UK), NEC (NL), Regional Development Agency West Flanders (BE), Lloyd’s Register EMEA (UK) and Ghent University (BE). MET-CERTIFIED will run from 01/09/2016 until 31/12/2019.

The project

DNV had issued DNV-OSS-312 ‘Certification of wave and tidal energy converters in 2008’ and DNVGL-SE-0163 ‘Certification of Tidal Turbines and Arrays’ in 2015. Both have been widely used by the tidal industry for certification. However, at present no consistent IEC certification scheme for marine energy has been developed and implemented by all main stakeholders. The expectation is that it will eventually come into existence over the next 3 years under the umbrella of the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).

MET-CERTIFIED will help to accelerate the development of an IEC certification scheme for the sector, thus increasing and accelerating the adoption of insurable and bankable tidal power projects.

MET-CERTIFIED is co-financed by the European Fund for Regional Development (ERFD) under grant agreement No 2S01-020. In addition, the Ministry of Economic Affairs in the Netherlands, Province of South-Holland and North-Holland and the Belgian Province of West Flanders are offering financial support.

MET-CERTIFIED targets stakeholders around certification, from banks and insurers to consenting authorities, end-users, test facilities and certification bureaus.

Objectives

These are the general objectives of MET-CERTIFIED:

  • To accelerate and contribute to the development of mature and verified standards and certification schemes.
  • Share data on open water test site experience in order to stimulate access to and the development of other marine innovation locations.
  • Dissemination and recommendation to a wide network of stakeholders and EU.

The role of DNV

DNV’s role in the project is the provision of feedback relating to existing and draft IEC TC 114 Technical Specifications for the tidal sector. This is to be performed on some specific projects under MET-Certified and is also based on many years of experience harnessed from work carried out as certification body/third party in certification and verification projects for tidal energy converters.

DNV, as a leading certification body, has pioneered third party activities in the marine renewables sector, by developing certification schemes based on technology qualification process as described in DNVGL-SE-0163 ‘Certification of Tidal Turbines and Arrays’, as well as the risk-based standard DNVGL-ST-0164 ‘Tidal Turbine’. The knowledge accumulated by DNV in this subject will be used towards the objectives of the MET-Certified project

Learn more about the project: http://www.met-certified.eu.