New design options for the improvement of the Mutriku power plant

This research studies several possibilities to improve the efficiency of the Mutriku breakwater wave power plant. The experimental work has been carried out in the 12.5 m long wave flume located at the laboratory of Fluid Mechanics of the Energy Engineering Department (UPV/EHU). The physically constructed oscillating water column device corresponds to one of the 16 chambers of the Mutriku breakwater wave power plant, according to the construction plan and applying a 1:36 scale. All the experiments were carried out at two tides that correspond to the medium and maximum tides of Mutriku location. A constant incident regular waves of 30 mm were generated at several periods; 0.7<T[s]<1.7 for the medium tide and 0.7<T[s]<2.1 for the maximum tide. The obtained results reveals that the promising configuration corresponds to the one containing lateral walls, so that the influence of harbour walls will be further studied.