About
The Ocean Energy Special Interest Group (SIG) serves as a hub at the University of Southampton for matters related to the role of seas and oceans in decarbonizing the economy. It also helps achieve net-zero goals worldwide.
Research areas
Our topics of interest are centred around technological, environmental, societal, financial, and policy challenges related to:
- harvesting of renewable energies (eg offshore wind, wave, freestream tidal energy, tidal barrages and floating solar systems)
- storage and transformation of offshore energy (eg energy islands, H2 creation)
- sustainable decommissioning of oil and gas infrastructures
Oceans are pivotal in the world strategy to meet the net-zero objectives, by providing abundant and clean sources of renewable energy. However, the full exploitation of this energy resource faces many challenges of diverse nature. These include the harsh offshore environment, sharing the ocean with many stakeholders, and evolving policy and regulations. Most importantly, it is essential to avoid mistakes of the past and wild industrialisation of our seas and oceans.
Vision and aims
Our vision is to bring together people and skills from across the university and many fields of research to develop transdisciplinary approaches for sustainable ocean energy exploitation. We do this through:
- fostering research collaboration between faculties and fields of research
- fostering collaboration with non-academic stakeholders and serving as a contact point for ocean energy matters
- raising awareness of ocean energy challenges and showcasing how the University of Southampton is working to address these challenges through research, knowledge exchange and other means
Activities
Our events and opportunities are designed in line with the goals we aim to achieve. They include a combination of internal and external activities, such as:
- themed workshops or lectures bringing together academic and non-academic partners
- sandpit activities to lay the foundations of interdisciplinary grant application or paper writing
- invited lectures on case studies from industry
- development of educational material or media briefings
To find out more about the Ocean Energy Special Interest Group and what we do, get in touch with group champions Dr Luke Myers, Dr Amber Jones, and Dr Wassim Dbouk.
Join the SMMI Community to sign up to this group, and any others of interest to you.
Protecting against rising sea levels
Research led by Professor Ivan Haigh on storm surges, sea level rise and climate change is ensuring flood barriers are maintained and future-proofed to protect 30 million people.
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Making offshore carbon storage safe
A team of researchers in Southampton played a key role in a European project to determine the viability of safely and securely storing carbon offshore.
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Optimising power transfer for renewable energy
Our researchers are running a series of projects to optimise the design of marine high voltage cables, used in offshore windfarms, to maximise power transfer and save money.
People, projects and publications
People
Boldrewood towing tank
National Infrastructure Laboratory
Developing sustainable and cost-efficient anchoring technologies for floating offshore wind, wave and tidal energy is essential to enable net-zero objectives.
Marine energy presents an engineering challenge, it is difficult to do but the rewards could be access to a secure and huge energy resource.
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