Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult

The Offshore Renewables Energy (ORE) Catapult is the UK’s leading innovation centre for offshore renewable energy helping to reduce the cost of offshore renewable energy, supporting the growth of the supply chain, and creating UK benefit. We are an independent business and our team of over 300 people has extensive technical and research capabilities, industry experience and project track record.

The technology development site in Blyth focusses on the testing and validation of parts of offshore wind turbines and high voltage (HV) power systems. This includes a substantial materials testing capability across three laboratories: the HV insulation , the turbine blades composite and rain erosion lab, and a future tribology lab to support research into  wear on moving metallic parts. We are a UKAS accredited testing facility to ISO/IEC 17025 and to an array of standards for HV systems and blade erosion (Ref. 2769).

Our team offers a range of services from testing (e.g., tensile testing, thermal analysis) to advisory and research into materials for many applications. We specialise in characterisation of polymer and polymer composites, with particular focus on materials selection, industrial processing, and lifetime estimations. We also perform failure investigations and root-cause analysis.