The Canary Islands have become much more than a highly regarded tourist destination. Now they are also a European benchmark in research that attracts and retains the talent of scientists from around the world and participates in essential international projects for the study and observation of the ocean.
This has been the case since November 2016, when the Canary Islands Ocean Platform (PLOCAN) was installed 1.5 kilometers off the northeast coast of the island of Gran Canaria and at a depth of 30 meters, financed with funds from the European Union, from the Government of Spain and the Autonomous Community of the Canary Islands.
This initiative benefits from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), a collective and coordinated effort at European level to promote investments that promote job creation, economic growth, competitiveness and the increase of the productive capacity of Europe and its infrastructure.
Its mission is to promote scientific-technological development and innovation in the marine and maritime field; accelerate the time to market of your results and products; and promote economic growth and job creation. To meet these challenges, its facilities offer efficient access to the ocean at increasing depths and in an environmentally sustainable way.
At PLOCAN – one of the largest facilities of this type in Europe – around twenty teams of scientists work in fields such as biotechnology and renewable energies. The infrastructure also has an onshore facility and a marine test bench located next to the nearby port of Taliarte, in the city of Telde. The construction of these facilities and their operation until 2021 have an expected cost of 54 million euros, contributed by the Government of the Canary Islands and the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness, and whose infrastructures are 85% financed with Union funds European.
Since 2012, the project has involved 431 partners from 39 countries and 1,500 researchers , and PLOCAN has already participated in more than 45 international initiatives. The most visible face of the project is the offshore platform, which rests on the seabed and is made up of several levels.
In the upper one there is a helipad capable of accommodating helicopters up to 18 meters in length and 6 tons in weight. Below is the command center, an 86 m2 room raised above the deck and with a 360-degree view. All the control and operation activities of the platform are managed from there.
Further down, a two-story building includes laboratories, bedrooms, classrooms, kitchen, dining room … It can accommodate up to forty researchers. On the lower level, a 590 m2 hangar has a 6 x 8 meter open test tank that facilitates experiments and the launching of autonomous underwater vehicles and equipment into the sea, some of them capable of reaching a depth of 1,000 meters. . At the base are the various facilities rooms and the energy management team.
On your site
On November 30, 2016, three tugboats left the Canary Islands Oceanic Platform at the site
where he develops his research work.
The illustration shows the PLOCAN test bench, located next to the northeast coast of Gran Canaria, and the characteristics of the vehicles and boats based on the platform. / PLOCAN
PLOCAN is completed with a test bench and a small floating observatory.
The test bed covers the marine-terrestrial public domain area of the northeast coast of Gran Canaria, an area of about 23 km2 with a maximum depth of 600 meters. Its objective is to provide companies and research groups the opportunity to demonstrate how the technologies they develop work before launching into commercialization.
The observatory, for its part, integrates all kinds of sensors to monitor regional and global coastal marine phenomena and ecosystems. The Canary Islands Ocean Platform, framed in the category of Singular Scientific and Technical Infrastructure (ICTS), is part of the efforts of the European Union, the Government of the Canary Islands and the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness to lead the growth of the economy blue, based on projects that allow sustainable development.
In recent years, the Canary Islands have established themselves at the forefront of biotechnology based on marine organisms, fishing activity or the cultivation of marine species.
To work and live
The PLOCAN platform has dimensions of 38 by 32 meters (approximately 100 m2 per floor), classrooms, hangar, a helipad at the top and nine rooms for researchers.
