Analysis and Comparison of Tidal Datasets for Resource Assessment and Network Modelling

The tidal resource is highly spatially and temporally variable. For tidal current energy to be economically exploited, certain conditions need to be fulfilled. Foremost, the strength of the resource needs to be quantified. This paper will build on and expand simplified analysis methods so far adopted for regional and national scale resource assessments. High quality data collection for interesting sites is highly desirable but very expensive. Existing publicly available datasets have therefore typically been used to examine the resource. A methodology is needed to combine all of the available datasets to produce an improved resource assessment methodology.