Brian Polagye

Research Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering

Co-Director, Northwest National Marine Renewable Energy Center

Affiliate Investigator, Applied Physics Laboratory

Contact Information

Office: MEB 302
Phone: 206-543-7544
Fax: 206-685-8047
Email: bpolagye@uw.edu

Schools & Degrees

PhD Mechanical Engineering, University of Washington, 2009
MSME Mechanical Engineering, University of Washington, 2005
BSE Mechanical Engineering, Princeton University, 2000

Interest Group

Energy and Fluids

Biography

My research focuses on sustainable electricity generation from the kinetic energy in moving water, particularly tidal current energy.

Characterizing Tidal Energy Resources

Maximizing power generation at a tidal energy site requires information about the hydrokinetic resource at spatial scales ranging from 10 cm to 10 km and time scales ranging from fractions of a second to years. This understanding is gained by developing new site survey techniques, models to predict deterministic and stochastic components of the tidal resource, and methodologies to analyze collected data. Information is used by site developers to estimate long-term power generation potential and device developers to estimate design loads.

Tidal Energy Sustainability

A renewable resource is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for sustainable power generation. Research in this area seeks to improve the sustainability of tidal energy by improving our understanding of environmental effects, in order to influence engineering decisions related to turbine design. This is done through a combination of field studies, instrumentation development, and modeling. Specific areas of interest are in the acoustic effects of tidal energy, interactions between marine life and tidal turbines at close range, and the consequences of energy removal on estuarine systems.

Instrumentation Micropower

Long-term monitoring of tidal energy sites is constrained by the power available to operate instrumentation. This limits the type of instrumentation that can be deployed and the maximum duration of observations. Given that the average resource intensity within a meter of the seabed generally exceeds 500 W/m² at tidal energy sites, micropower generators with swept areas on the order of 1 m² incorporated into instrumentation packages could significantly enhance monitoring capabilities. We are developing a self-contained, micro-scale tidal generation system capable of meeting a continuous load of 20 W via a small, rechargeable battery bank.

Selected Publications

Polagye, B. and J. Thomson. Tidal energy resource characterization: methodology and field study in Admiralty Inlet, Puget Sound, US, Submitted to Proc. IMechE, Part A: J. Power and Energy.
Polagye, B. and J. Thomson. A leading-order noise correction for acoustic Doppler current profiler measurements at hydrokinetic energy sites (technical communication), Submitted to IEEE J. Ocean. Eng.
Thomson, J., B. Polagye, V. Durgesh, and M. Richmond. Measurements of turbulence at two tidal energy sites in Puget Sound, WA (USA), Accepted for publication in IEEE J. Ocean. Eng.
Polagye, B., B. Van Cleve, A. Copping, and K. Kirkendall (eds.) Environmental effects of tidal energy development: Proceedings of a scientific workshop, March 22-25, 2010. NOAA Technical Memorandum, NMFS F/SPO-116, 2011.
Polagye, B. and P. Malte. Far-field dynamics of tidal energy extraction in channel networks, Renewable Energy, 36(1), 2010.
Polagye, B., M. Kawase, and P. Malte. In-stream tidal energy potential of Puget Sound, Washington, Proc. IMechE, Part A: J. Power and Energy, 223(5), 2009.
Polagye, B., Malte, P., Kawase, M., and Durran, D. Effect of large-scale kinetic power extraction on time-dependent estuaries, Proc. IMechE, Part A: J. Power and Energy. 222 (5), 2008.
Polagye, B., P. Malte, and K. Hodgson. An economic analysis of bio-energy options using thinnings from overstocked forests, Biomass and Bio-energy, 31(2-3), 2007.