Public Funding for Avalon Sciences Limited

With the global drive to increase the proportion of energy generation through renewable sources, geothermal energy has attracted recent attention for its ability to produce both heat and electrical energy without a dependence on environmental factors such as wind or solar output. A geothermal power station extracts heat deep from within the Earth's crust where areas of rock typically reach 240°C. Creating geothermal power stations in "hot rock" areas requires drilling boreholes into the Earth's crust and creating pathways for water to flow through hot bedrock. This drilling activity requires careful monitoring to ensure the intended water pathways are correctly created and to satisfy strict environmental monitoring (especially in the UK) for micro-seismic activity to ensure that larger seismic events are not induced by this deep drilling. Vertical Seismic Profiling (VSP) with micro-seismic sensors is used to achieve this monitoring in addition to monitoring the ongoing health of a geothermal station during its lifetime. Avalon Sciences Limited (ASL) is a world-leading manufacturer of VSP systems which have been used predominantly in the oil & gas industry for exploration for the past 35 years. With ASL's in-house research & development centre, innovation in sensor design has enabled reliable operation of their electronic and optical VSP systems at 200°C. However, these systems cannot survive for long in the excessively high temperature geothermal wells. In this project, ASL will develop a bespoke all-optical (no electronics) micro-seismic VSP prototype capable of operating up to 300°C for long-term micro-seismic monitoring for the geothermal energy industry.

Thermoelectric materials are capable of converting waste heat into electricity. It is forecast that there will be ~20bn connected devices by 2020\. Postulating 50% are battery powered, with 1-year battery lifetime, this would create demand for an additional 5bn batteries/year. Thereby, the use of thermoelectric generators for powering IoT devices is becoming very attractive. In addition, the use of Li-batteries is not recommended in some industries such as Oil&Gas Industry (OGI) due to their risk of explosion and their inefficiency over 80C. Thereby, OGI is moving towards thermoelectric energy harvesting to replace batteries in a wide range of sensing applications. The thermoelectric materials market is dominated by Bismuth Telluride (Bi3Te2) which exhibits the greatest figure of merit, zT up to 200C leading to it mainly being used for waste heat recovery within this range. Above this temperature, its zT dramatically reduces therefore becoming prohibitively inefficient. The current solutions to address the efficiency is the use of lead telluride (PbTe) at medium temperatures or silicon-germanium (SiGe) for \>500C. Other disadvantages are the toxicity and the high price of Tellurium due to its scarcity. The market therefore requires the following 1)more effective energy harvesters for applications at medium temperature (200-350C) ideal for the Oil&Gas Industry temperatures, and 2)Generating more power in smaller and more cost-effective devices for sensor applications. TEGMATIC will address these needs by developing magnesium-antimonide (Mg3Sb2)-based materials and their commercialisation. This cutting-edge material offers: 1)More efficiency, since MgSb-based materials outperforms the current state-of-the-art - Mg3Sb2 achieves a zT = 1.4, in comparison to 0.2 for Bi3Te2 at 300-350C. Also, MgSb-materials has significantly superior mechanical toughness (_KIC_ = 3.0 MPa\*m1/2) than the State-of-the-art. 2)Less space and cost-effective: MgSb-based materials possess low thermal conductivity, so the leg length will be reduced by 40% decreasing the cost per module by 12-20%. Moreover, the raw material cost is cheaper for MgSb estimated at 9.5-11 $/Kg than BiTe 44.1 $/Kg. 3)Environmentally friendly: Magnesium and Antimony are non-toxic and abundant in the Earth. TEGMATIC is a collaboration between ETL and Avalon Sciences. ETL, a worldwide recognised innovative SME leader in the thermoelectric market, currently supplying ~2% of the global thermoelectric modules due in part to their in-house automated manufacturing. Avalon Sciences (ASL) is a manufacturer of borehole seismic equipment.

Seismic exploration requirements are constantly pushing the boundaries of measurement capability: very high temperatures and pressures are directly related to the depth of a survey. Electronic systems for producing surveys are inadequate in many deeper boreholes because the electronics are pushed beyond the limits of their capability. An equivalent passive fibre system offers the promise of improved sensitivity, as well as considerably better tolerance to higher temperatures. However, to develop this system, it is necessary to design a new optical architecture which aligns with the stringent requirements of the borehole system. Specifically, only a small number of fibres are available, and yet several hundred sensors must be connected. Part of this architecture will rely on the ability to access specific fibres contained in an armoured bundle without damaging or touching the other fibres; the delicate process for achieving this is challenging and requires considerable R&D effort. If successful, this project will enable Avalon Sciences to broaden its market share as well as enter new global markets. Furthermore, the expansion of our optical facilities will provide a unique and useful resource for local SMEs, as well as a valuable oppportunity for local schools to observe more of advanced technology and engineering.

To embed capability in Computational Fluid Dynamics and advanced engineering theory to generate and test designs for improved down-hole tooling systems for use in oil and gas industry.

Awaiting Public Summary