University of Malta. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Abstract
Malta, being a very small and densely populated island in the central Mediterranean, has little space
for large scale onshore wind turbine or photovoltaic projects. Maltese territorial waters are mostly too deep for
conventional offshore wind farms to be constructed save for a handful of near-shore reefs and shoals. The quest for
offshore wind turbine structure designs capable of being installed in deeper waters will revolutionize prospects for
offshore wind projects worldwide; but even more so in the Mediterranean region. This paper presents a preliminary
engineering analysis to develop two cost-optimized offshore floating structures to support (1) a single multi-megawatt
scale wind turbine and (2) a solar photovoltaic farm with the same energy production as that of the single wind
turbine. The primary objective of this work is to determine the most economically feasibility option for harvesting
renewable energy at sea: offshore wind or offshore solar photovoltaic energy.peer-reviewe
