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ORPC, Igiugig say turbine successful In-river test system generated electrical power for village over summer; next step is commercial design based on lessons learned Alan Bailey Petroleum News
Ocean Renewable Power Co. says that the prototype in-river “RivGen” power generation device that it installed in the Kvichak River over the summer has proved successful. The installation was designed to test the in-river system as a potential power source for the village of Igiugig near the end of Lake Iliamna in southwest Alaska.
“We are thrilled with the successful demonstration of the self-deployment and power generation features of our system and the lessons learned will be invaluable to us as we complete our commercial design of RivGen next year,” said ORPC President and CEO Chris Sauer in a Sept. 24 press release. “We are indebted to our Alaska-based project team, the Village of Igiugig, and the local contractors whose professionalism, ingenuity and perseverance really paid off.”
And the village residents also seem happy with the results of the test.
“With incredible teamwork and ingenuity, ORPC and Igiugig Village generated hydrokinetic power from the Kvichak River,” said AlexAnna Salmon, Igiugig village president. “The (village) council is impressed that the RivGen System was installed with local equipment, provided significant power for our micro-grid and, most importantly, coexisted with the fish habitat that the Kvichak River is so famous for. We are very thankful to everyone that has made this journey a success.”
Submerged turbine ORPC’s in-current technology uses a submerged turbine with helical shaped blades to employ flowing river water to generate electricity. The device deployed at Igiugig was a scaled-down version of a system that the company has installed offshore Maine to generate power from tidal currents. The type of system tested at Igiugig might provide a practical source of power for rural villages that are suffering from the high cost of diesel generated electricity and that are located next to rivers. And there may be applications for the technology in other remote regions of the world, ORPC thinks.
The cost of diesel-generated electricity in Igiugig is almost 80 cents per kilowatt hour, nearly eight times the average cost in the United States, ORPC said.
ORPC installed its prototype RivGen device in the Kvichak River for a couple of months this summer to test the effectiveness of the system as a power source and to test the practicalities of installing the system in the river. The company has previously said that, if the test proved successful, it hopes to make a more permanent installation of a similar device in 2015. The concept is to place the device in the river in early June of each year and then remove the device again in mid-April, before ice starts flowing out of Lake Iliamna during the spring breakup.
Self-deployment Highlights of this summer’s project included several deployments and retrievals of the device using its self-ballasting system, thus proving the viability of the system’s self-deployment and retrieval features. ORPC said its engineers were able to operate and adjust the system remotely; the device delivered the projected amount of power to its onshore station; and comprehensive monitoring of the device demonstrated no negative impacts on fish and other aquatic life.
ORPC has been working with Homer Electric Association to investigate the use of a similar system to generate power from tidal currents in Cook Inlet. The company is also interested in implementing a tidal power system in False Pass, off the western end of the Alaska Peninsula.
The Denali Commission and the Alaska Energy Authority provided funding support for the Igiugig project, while the U.S. Department of Energy and the University of Alaska also assisted the project.
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