2023 ARPA-e SHARKS Summit

Image described by caption and credit below the image
Photo courtesy of Ben Loeffler.
Left to Right: BladeRunner Energy's Austin Payne and Moriel Arango, ACEP's Ben Loeffler and Kawsar Ahammed at the 51·çÁ÷¹ÙÍø SHARKS project booth.

April 12, 2023

Last summer, ACEP’s hydrokinetics team tested the BladeRunner Energy turbine during their field season. Ben Loeffler and new 51·çÁ÷¹ÙÍø electrical engineering graduate student Kawsar Ahammed were joined by representatives from BladeRunner Energy in presenting their results at a booth at the annual ARPA-e Energy Innovation Summit.

The summit, held March 22–24 in Washington, D.C., hosted over 400 ARPA-e projects and shared research outcomes via booths in the Technology Showcase. ARPA-e, or Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy, is a U.S. government agency tasked with promoting and funding research and development of advanced energy technologies.

Within ARPA-e, the SHARKS — or the Submarine Hydrokinetic and Riverine Kilo-megawatt Systems program — seeks to develop technologies to harness river and tidal currents for both microgrid- and utility-scale applications.

ACEP’s ongoing SHARKS project is developing BladeRunner Energy’s unique turbine design and testing it at the Tanana River Test Site near Nenana Alaska. Fieldwork at the site will resume this summer.

For more information on hydrokinetic research at ACEP, please contact Ben Loeffler at bhloeffler@alaska.edu.