Levelized Cost of Energy: A First Evaluation for a Self Balancing Kinetic Turbine

Since 2009, the team DIMEG Unical and SintEnergy srl have been developing an innovative kinetic turbine able to produce energy form tidal currents. The machine is able to maintain the frontal position to the flow only thanks to its geometry and technical solutions. This turbine doesn’t need any concrete structure, nor pylons or floating devices; in terms of energy conversion, it doesn’t use any nacelle, gearbox, external generator, but only a little stabilizer, a permanent magnetic generator and a coast anchoring system able to retain the machine during the working operations. A first cost evaluation has been performed in this work, together with an approximate LCOE calculation, in order to compare this device to the other ones in the pre commercialization phase. The project is in an early stage of the development, but quite ready for a prototype realization.