This chapter has shown that there is a balance to be made in device layout and grid connection for MECs that are fixed to the sea-bed and MECs that are detachable, floating and moored. In general, arrays with floating and moored devices will either contain fewer devices but be of larger geographical area. There will be an optimisation of the redundancy incorporated into arrays, but experience from off-shore wind farms suggests that the practicable degree of array redundancy will be modest. There is some interest in the development of DC networks, because of device architecture and possible savings in the transmission of energy from arrays far offshore. However, experience from off-shore wind farms suggests that long-distance DC connections will be many years away. There is insufficient installed experience or published information on off-shore MECs to draw specific conclusions about the best way to specify MEC layout and grid connection.

Chapter Contents:

• 8.1 Introduction
• 8.2 MEC arrangements and array cables
• 8.3 Device and array layouts
• 8.4 AC versus DC connection
• 8.5 Off-shore and on-shore substations
• 8.6 Effect of array technology and layout on reliability
• 8.7 Summary

Inspec keywords: offshore installations; power grids; redundancy; wave power plants; wind power plants

Other keywords: grid connection; energy transmission; tidal device layout; redundancy optimisation; off-shore wind farm; off-shore MEC; wave device layout; DC network development

Subjects: Reliability; Wave power