Eighteen months in: from concept to cryostat
MARES has closed its first Reporting Period (RP1, October 2024 – March 2026) — eighteen months in which the consortium moved from a promising concept on paper to a fully frozen, manufacturable design for the world’s first Reciprocating Superconducting Generator (RSG) for wave energy.
Our goal remains the same as the day we started: prove, at laboratory scale (TRL4), that superconductivity can deliver a Power Take-Off (PTO) for wave energy converters that is more powerful, more compact, and far less dependent on critical rare-earth materials than anything on the market today. This edition takes you through what RP1 delivered, why we adjusted our approach along the way, and what’s coming next.
RP1 in numbers
- 4 of 4 milestones and 9 of 9 deliverables submitted on schedule
- Force target exceeded by more than 3x, confirmed in simulation (REBCO configuration)
- 6 papers published, 5 more submitted — 11 active in total
- 3 conference talks: EWTEC 2025 (×2), ICSM 2025
- 3 General Assemblies: Madrid kick-off, Genoa 1st GA, virtual 2nd GA
The technical story, in brief
The heart of MARES is a Cylindrical Switched Reluctance Machine: the moving translator is a block of laminated magnetic steel with no windings, no magnets. The superconducting coils stay stationary, sealed inside a flexible cryostat — no moving cryogenic feedthroughs to fail at sea.
What RP1 delivered:
- Design frozen and validated: across electromagnetics, cryogenics and power electronics, using our in-house “Mares Model One” tool cross-checked against full 3D FEM simulation.
- Both superconducting pathways selected: REBCO tapes (Shanghai Superconductors) and an optimised MgB2 wire (with ASG Superconductors and the University of Bologna) — a fourfold cut in AC coupling losses versus the baseline.
- Headline result: force target exceeded by more than 3x, confirmed in simulation. Physical testing follows once the prototype is built.
- A smarter test strategy: instead of two separate machines, one modular rig now hosts either superconducting technology under identical conditions — de-risked further by an intermediate one-phase validator we’ve nicknamed “Little Mares”.
For the full technical breakdown — the MMO code, iron loss modelling, the power electronics topology, cryogenic budget — see our detailed RP1 write-up.
Life in the consortium
- The Consortium Agreement was signed by all 11 partners in February 2025.
- We held our Kick-off Meeting in Madrid (CIEMAT, October 2024), our 1st General Assembly in Genoa (ASG Superconductors, October 2025), and our 2nd General Assembly virtually in April 2026.
- In November 2025, our coordination lead at CIEMAT, Dr. Luis García-Tabarés, reached retirement age and moved into an Emeritus Researcher role, in which he remains actively engaged with the project. Coordination has passed to Dr. Javier Munilla Lopez, also of CIEMAT.
Sharing our science
RP1 was a strong period for dissemination, ahead of our own targets:
- Talks at the European Wave and Tidal Energy Conference (EWTEC 2025) — one on the RSG concept itself, one on our AC-loss-reducing switching strategy — and at the International Conference on Superconductivity and Magnetism (ICSM 2025) in Turkey, as part of a dedicated session on superconductivity at sea.
- A live superconducting coil demonstration at the Transfiere Forum in Málaga, and participation in the Big Science Industry Forum in Madrid.
- Specialised lectures and hands-on HTS coil demonstrations at CERN’s INFIERI 2025 international summer school in Pisa.
- Our redesigned project website and social media channels went live — you’re reading the result.
What’s next
With the design frozen, the consortium’s attention shifts to Work Package 3, led by ANTEC: manufacturing the coils, the flexible cryostat, the iron translator and stator, the power converters, and the cryogenic supply system — starting with “Little Mares.” Early results from CERN on bellows solutions for the cryostat (comparing PTFE and metallic options) are already informing that design.
Looking further ahead, WP4 will put the assembled prototype through back-to-back testing at CIEMAT, and WP6 will begin adapting the RSG concept to two real Wave Energy Converters — WEDGE Global’s UNDIGEN and Teamwork Technology’s SYMPHONY.
Thank you for following along. For updates between newsletters, follow us on X and LinkedIn.
MARES has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 101172746. Follow the project on LinkedIn and X, and subscribe to the newsletter at maresproject.com.
