WVII reports on energy testing being conducted in new wave lab
WVII (Channel 7) reported on energy testing being conducted at the Harold Alfond W2 Ocean Engineering Lab in the University of Maine Advanced Structures and Composites Center. RTI Wave Power of York, Maine, has been testing its sixth generation RTI F2 QD, a 1:50-scale wave energy converter at the facility. The lab is one of five U.S. facilities competitively selected to conduct 1:50-scale testing as part of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Wave Energy Prize this December. The Wave Energy Prize is a 20-month design-build-test prize competition that seeks to drive game-changing innovations in wave energy devices through a rigorous testing program. The winning team of the prize will receive a $1.5 million award. UMaine will be testing three wave energy devices as part of the program. “This is why we built this facility, to be able to bring entrepreneurs to this laboratory and help them develop their technologies so they can become commercial,” said Habib Dagher, director of the UMaine Advanced Structures and Composites Center. The Bangor Daily News also published an article on the testing.