ZERO carbon transport and energy systems in Danube region

The objective is to implement and upscale existing solutions that were developed during Romania-Bulgaria cross-border cooperation program consisting in: electrical/hydrogen powered boats (8 to 20 passengers), kinetic water turbine technical project; and other products developed by the consortium such as wind turbines and other eco-friendly energy generation solutions.
A strong collaboration was built during the 2007-2013 cross-border cooperation program between twp Romanian institutes, COMOTI Romanian Research and Development Institute for Gas Turbines and National Institute for Research and Development in Electrical Engineering (ICPE-CA) and two Bulgarian entities, “Anghel Kanchev” University of Ruse and Silistra Municipality. A series of projects were implemented, two of them being of great relevance in the present EU Missions “Restore Ocean and Waters”, namely: CleeA (Clean Access in Calarasi-Silistra Cross-Border Area”) coordinated by ICPE-CA and ElectroRiver (Joint study regarding an electro-generator system powered by water turbine for cross-border ecological electrical transport system) coordinated by COMOTI.
Now, it is time to up-scale, replicate or further develop these solutions involving local authorities, stakeholders and SMEs as much as possible in the whole Danube region and especially in the Danube Delta. A budget in the order of 12 million Euros is sought, with about 25% from private funding and 75% EU contribution.
As outcomes of the action, we propose a transport system based on the existing rather small electrical boat (8 to 20 passengers) which is currently under development for hydrogen power too, and an ecological electrical power generating system based on the TurboRiver-RB7 kinetic water turbine sizing about 7kW for 1m/s water velocity.
The impact of implementing such solutions consists in reducing to ZERO the carbon footprint of the relatively small boats travelling on the Danube and Danube Delta since pure electrical boats were already developed, and the possibility to power them using the kinetic energy of the Danube via a water turbine that doesn’t need dam or other special infrastructure.