Ocean Networks Canada to monitor ocean turbines in Bay of Fundy

Canada’s efforts to demonstrate world leadership in tidal energy research and technology are taking a significant step forward, as the UVic-led Ocean Networks Canada’s Centre for Enterprise and Engagement (ONCCEE) partners with researchers and industry to design and install the world’s first cabled underwater monitoring platform specifically for extreme, high-flow tide conditions.

Nova Scotia’s Bay of Fundy is home to the world’s highest tides, and the site of FORCE (Fundy Ocean Research Centre for Energy), Canada’s leading test centre for in-stream tidal energy. ONCCEE is developing an environmental monitoring system for FORCE—a requirement for their research using sea floor turbines.

“This program will demonstrate how world-leading Canadian technologies and expertise in ocean observing systems can be applied to support the validation of technologies to monitor in-stream tidal energy projects in high flow environments,” says ONCCEE director Scott McLean. “As a collaborative, cross-country initiative, the program will build Canadian expertise in this important emerging global market sector.”
The monitoring program, announced on Sept. 13, is supported by $10 million from the Government of Canada, Encana Corporation, FORCE participants, and ONCCEE.

ONCCEE, based at UVic, is a Centre of Excellence in Commercialization and Research funded by the Canadian government in 2009 under the Networks of Centres of Excellence program. As Canada’s Centre of Excellence in Ocean Observing Systems, ONCCEE has a mandate to generate socio-economic benefits from Canada’s significant investments in UVic’s Ocean Networks Canada (ONC) Observatory and its two networks, VENUS and NEPTUNE Canada, through a series of programs focused on ocean science, technology and education.
The monitoring platform, based on ONC’s world-leading technology, will be connected to the FORCE observation facility by submarine cable. Data from the site will be publicly available via the internet.