Prof Susan Gourvenec, delivers public lecture at the Royal Institution “Secret superpowers of the seabed: the hidden piece of the energy puzzle for net-zero”

Deputy Director of the Southampton Marine and Maritime Institute (SMMI) and RAEng Chair in Emerging Technologies for Intelligent & Resilient Ocean Engineering presented a public lecture at the Royal Institution in London, “Secret superpowers of the seabed: the hidden piece of the energy puzzle for net-zero”.

The lecture, which took place on Friday 23rd June 2023, coincided with International Women in Engineering Day and was sponsored by the Royal Academy of Engineering.

Susan started off by presenting some of the known pieces of the energy puzzle, including the rate of global warming due to increased GHGs in the atmosphere, driven by anthropogenic activities; and the big contributors – such as energy generation. Susan explored the size and source of our current energy balance and opportunities for upscaling renewable energy generation particularly from offshore wind. Susan then explored the secret superpowers of the seabed, and how their evolution impacts the integrity of infrastructures built in the ocean. From the microscale of seabed sediments to the individual foundations placed to support the turbines, Susan unpacked what it takes to build windfarms at the scale the world needs. In the talk – along with demos - Susan unearthed seabed superpowers that engineers can tap into to achieve these ambitions, as well as highlighting the latest emerging technologies that will enable us to design and build offshore wind farms at a scale, pace and accuracy that is currently impossible.

You can watch the presentation via the Ri website here https://www.rigb.org/whats-on/secret-superpowers-seabed

Find out more about the Royal Institution here https://www.rigb.org/about-us