Skip to main content
Ocean Networks Canada

Ocean Networks Canada

Search form

Facebook iconTwitter iconLinkedIn iconYouTube iconFlickr iconInstagram icon

Menu

  • About Us
    • About Us
    • Jobs & Opportunities
    • Events & Workshops
    • Contact Us
    • Support Us
    • Annual Report 2019-2020
    • Organization
      • Leadership
      • Staff
      • Boards
      • Committees
    • Funders, Associate Members & Partners
      • Funders
      • Associate Members
      • Partners
  • Science
    • Science
    • Active Research
    • Highlights
    • Science Plan
      • Summary
      • Science Themes
    • Publications
      • General Interest
      • Academic
    • Getting Involved
      • Proposals
  • Innovation Centre
    • Innovation Centre
    • About the Innovation Centre
    • Success Stories
    • Contact Us
    • Smart Ocean™ Systems
      • Sensors and Instruments
      • Technology Demos
      • Ocean Observing Systems
      • Earthquake Early Warning
    • Partners & Networks
      • Industry Network
      • Global Partnerships
      • R&D Support
      • Students in Industry
    • Atlantic Partners
  • Learning
    • Learning
    • Learning Highlights
    • Learning Events
    • Partnerships
    • Contact Us
    • Ocean Sense
      • Community Observatories
        • Cambridge Bay
        • Campbell River
        • Kitamaat Village
        • Prince Rupert
      • Teacher Info
      • Student Info
      • Resources & Lessons
    • Get Involved
      • For Students
        • For Undergrads & Grads
      • For Educators
        • Educator Opportunities
      • For Communities
      • Ship2Shore
      • Citizen Science
        • Coastbuster
        • Digital Fishers
      • Youth Science Ambassador
    • Resources
      • Learning at Home
      • Educator Resources
      • Ocean Alive!
      • Oceanography 101
      • About the Observatories
      • Research Ideas
      • Student Reports
  • Observatories
    • Observatories
    • Arctic
    • Atlantic
    • Pacific
    • Mobile Platforms
    • Infrastructure
      • Data Facilities
      • Platforms
      • Devices & Sensors
      • Cables & Connectors
    • Expeditions
      • Wiring the Abyss
      • Expedition Logs
      • Maintenance Processes
    • Notices
      • Information for Mariners
      • Alerts
  • Data & Tools
    • Data & Tools
    • Highlights
    • Data Quality
    • Preview & Download
      • Preview & Visualize
      • Data Download Tools
      • State of the Ocean Plots
      • Ocean Report Card
    • Apps & Services
      • Mobile Apps
      • OPeNDAP Web Services
      • Related Sources
      • Earthquake Data Dashboard
    • Data Help
      • Usage Policy
      • Tutorials & Help Pages
      • Request Help
  • Sights & Sounds
    • Sights & Sounds
    • Terms of Use
    • Video
      • Live Video
      • Video Highlights
      • Video Archives
    • Images
      • Maps
    • Audio
      • Audio Highlights
      • Audio Archive
  • News
    • News
    • Stories
    • Newsletters
    • Calendar
    • Media Relations
      • Backgrounders
      • Downloads
      • In the News
      • News Releases
      • Media Contacts

About Us

You are here

  1. Home
Jul 10, 2011

VENUS Work Launches Oceanworks to Commercial Success in the Mediterranean

A Vancouver company’s work for VENUS and NEPTUNE Canada opened a new path in its technology development and led it to a massive project in Cyprus.

For years, OceanWorks has been building systems for submarine rescue, deep diving, and other complex manned systems for navies and private companies around the world. The ocean, with its pervasive salt and inescapable wetness, is great at destroying just about anything humans make. The particular conditions at various VENUS and NEPTUNE Canada sites—be it intense pressures, currents, or sediment buildup--require custom equipment, and OceanWorks’ experience in adapting delicate electronics and sturdy hardware for such environments landed the company work with VENUS.

OceanWorks’ first project with VENUS was to design its scientific instrument interface module, or SIIM, and the 2-tonne nodes, which are made up of a fixed base on the seafloor and a removable electronics pod. Each SIIM houses electronics that provides power and a communication path to various instruments attached to it, enabling sensors to sample and stream their measurements online. Their first SIIM design, a silver cylinder a little bigger than a diving tank, could be placed up to 70m from a node and can support 5 to 10 instruments. VENUS also needed removable node pods to fit in their 4.2 x 2.5 m fixed bases.

“To be honest, we thought it would be easy,” says Derek White, a member of the sales team at OceanWorks. Applying a theory always leads to engineering issues, he explains, but in this case there was nothing drastic. “It was a great introduction to the kind of work we’re doing now.”

Their work snagged the attention of NEPTUNE Canada, which needed junction boxes based on the SIIMs that withstand even greater pressures and run power greater distances. Since then, OceanWorks refined the design, expanded the VENUS SIIM to fit more instruments, and toughened the power control system. They have supplied NEPTUNE Canada with 15 junction boxes, and 2 more are expectied by summer 2011. The VENUS cruise in December 2010 deployed 8 news SIIMs along with the upgraded Central node in the Strait of Georgia.

OceanWorks’ products put them on the radar of Harris Maritime Communications Services. Harris makes large buoys for ocean observing systems, including one run by the Oceanography Centre of Cyprus that has been monitoring and predicting coastal weather in the Mediterranean since 2004.

Recently, the Centre decided to add a massive tsunami detection network of seismometers and bottom pressure recorders spanning hundreds of kilometres across the seafloor. To do so, they teamed with CSNet, an offshore communications company, whose partnership with Harris led to OceanWorks securing the contract to supply five nodes—all stemming from that first contract for VENUS.

“We would not have gotten that project without the support and experience from VENUS and NEPTUNE Canada,” says White. The new project integrated the nodes and electro-optic cables up to 250 km long with Harris’s buoys, running the information via satellite back to headquarters. The system was launched in autumn 2010.

The project in Cyprus marked a turning point for OceanWorks in their ocean observing products. They’ve standardized their junction boxes, which has interested similar ocean observing programs around the world, and added ‘cabled observatory systems’ to their list of products.

People at VENUS and NEPTUNE Canada “are very collaborative and very open,” says White. “They helped a lot in developing the products that became our signature nodes and scientific instrument packages.”

Innovation Centre | OceanWorks | nodes

Printer-friendly versionPDF version

Related Stories

Ocean Tech Alliance Canada: A National Voice for the Blue Economy
Sep 5, 2017

ONC’s Innovation Centre: Serving the global blue economy
Dec 7, 2015

Prototype Equipment Design takes ONC innovation from concept to reality
May 28, 2015

Forging Partnerships with China
Nov 26, 2013

China Trade Mission Showcases B.C. Ocean Technology
Sep 4, 2013

icListen Hydrophone Excels in Innovation Centre Tests
Mar 22, 2013

2012: Innovation Centre Review
Jan 11, 2013

Calendar of Events

January 2021

  • « Prev  
  •   Next »
S M T W T F S
27
28
29
30
31
1
2
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
31
1
2
3
4
5
6
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Newsletter

Sign up for our monthly e-newsletter:

 

Tweets Follow @Ocean_Networks

 

 

Highlights

  • Audio
  • Data
  • Learning
  • Science
  • Video

Reading Room

  • Active Research
  • Backgrounders
  • FAQs
  • Glossary
  • News Briefs
  • News Stories
  • Newsletters
  • Publications

Cool Stuff

  • Apps
  • Digital Fishers
  • iBooks & e-Pubs
  • Live Video
  • Maps
  • Images
  • State of the Ocean

Data & Tools

  • Apps
  • Data Plots
  • Data Search
  • Data Policy
  • Data Help
  • OPeNDAP Web Services

Opportunities

  • Calendar
  • Educator Opportunities
  • Global Partnerships
  • Industry Network
  • Jobs
  • Staff List
  • Technology Services

Sites & Instruments

  • Arctic Sites
  • Northeast Pacific Sites
  • Salish Sea Sites
  • Notice to Mariners

Follow Us

Facebook iconTwitter iconLinkedIn iconYouTube iconFlickr iconInstagram icon

Sign up for our newsletter

Feedback

CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
Image CAPTCHA
Enter the characters shown in the image.

                              

About Us | Contact Us | Media Relations | Legal Notices

©   Ocean Networks Canada. All rights reserved.  2474 Arbutus Road, Victoria, BC, V8N 1V8 | 1.250.472.5400