Experimental verifications of offshore marine substation for grid-connection of wave energy farm

An offshore marine substation has been designed and constructed for grid-connection of a wave energy farm. The substation will be deployed 2 km off the Swedish West coast, on the seabed at a depth of 25 m. Before the deployment, the substation electrical circuit has been tested in the laboratory. The functionality and total substation efficiency have been evaluated at different voltage levels. A synchronous generator with variable speed control has been programmed to generate a similar voltage output as a single wave energy converter. The generator output has been connected to the substation and power transferred to the local grid at unity power factor. The impact on the total efficiency by adding a DC/DC boost converter is also discussed. The conducted experiments verify the functionality of the marine substation before deployment.