Abstract
With climate change on the rise, unprecedented dependence on electricity, and an increased incidence of extreme weather, the UNF team participating in the U.S. Department of Energy 2021 Marine Energy Collegiate Competition: Powering the Blue Economy wants to give an alternative solution to provide renewable energy in areas that lose electricity as a result of a natural disaster, or that due to their isolated location cannot use traditional renewable energy sources. This led to the creation of the Osprey C.R.E.W (Cheap Reliable Energy from Waves). The Osprey C.R.E.W. is a wave energy converter that uses the vertical motion of the ocean waves to generate electricity. The principle of energy conversion is Faraday’s Law of Electromagnetic Induction, which states that a magnetic field moving past a conductor will generate electricity. The UNF team has developed a numerical simulation to test how different parameters influence the output and has built three small-scale prototypes that have been tested in a wave tank. A medium-sized prototype and a wave pool are being constructed, with the expectation that the size will also increase the output.