Marine facility to make waves when it opens
Taoiseach Enda Kenny will be in Ringaskiddy on Saturday to open UCC’s Beaufort Building, a national research lab expected to position Ireland at the forefront of global maritime and energy research.
The State has ploughed €15.2m into the project, which has also secured private investment, to construct the 4,700sq m five-storey facility next to the National Maritime College of Ireland.
More than half of the building has been set aside for a 2,600sq m tank hall which will house four giant wave tanks, and a suite of electrical test infrastructure.
The tanks will allow scientists and engineers work on a range of marine renewable, coastal energy, and broader sustainable energy research projects. They will have access to a 35m x 12m x 3m deep “ocean testing facility” featuring 12 electric paddles to generate waves of up to one metre almost every three seconds. This tank has a movable floor required for maritime and wave research.
A second tank, which measures 25m x 18m x 2m deep, has 40 wave paddles which will be able to produce scaled-down model versions of real 3D seas. The tank hall also has a 27m x 3m x 1m deep tank which can mimic coastal scenarios and which will feature a flow facility to test tidal turbines.
The Beaufort has a range of mechanical and electrical workshops; a power take-off lab to capture energy generated by its test turbines; energy storage facilities; and smart-grid labs.
The Beaufort, which will house 135 researchers and support staff at full capacity, represents a major extension of UCC’s Environmental Research Institute (ERI) and will be UCC’s flagship presence on the IMERC (Irish Maritime and Energy Research Cluster) campus at Ringaskiddy. It will also be the headquarters of the MaREI (Marine Renewable Energy Ireland) Centre and the LIR National Ocean Test Facility.
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