Materials for maritime applications

Many cutting-edge industries associated with the marine environment are based at the tip of Finistère such as fisheries, leisure boating, transportation, defence and marine renewable energy. Specialists who can test the materials and structures that support these companies’ innovations have also found a home here.

For instance, at the National Institute for Ocean Science (Ifremer), teams from the Behaviour of Offshore Installations Laboratory (LCSM) work to improve our knowledge of how structures behave in the marine environment. They look at materials and material qualification, as well as the hydrodynamics and mechanics of structures and their surroundings.

Ifremer uses innovative tools that can replicate constraints in the marine environment, as well as an offshore testing site and a land-based test tank. These teams regularly assist start-ups and other companies by studying how well cables, ropes, anchor lines, fishing nets and other innovative composite materials withstand use and how they impact on their environment.

ENSTA Bretagne engineering school also specialises in testing, with its Masmeca platform. This can be employed to study the strength of steel used in construction – both on land and at sea – as well as that of composite materials used in aerospace, defence, leisure boating, fisheries, the offshore sector, shipbuilding and marine renewable energy.

This stands for ‘Du MAtériau à la Structure, MECanique expérimentale Avancée’