The Scottish Government has announced that five marine energy developers – including three tidal and two wave developers – are to share £7.9 million in funding.
The award is being made under the second round of the WATERS (Wave Tidal Energy: Research, Development Demonstration Support) programme aimed at helping Scottish developers and supply chain firms to benefit from the growing marine energy market.
The programme, which is a joint venture between the Scottish Government, Scottish Enterprise and Highlands and Islands Enterprise, with funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), was initially launched in 2010 with £6 million shared between four marine energy projects.
Scotrenewables Tidal Power is among the latest recipients, receiving a £1.2 million grant to put towards a £9.24 million project to design, construct and install a two-megawatt SR 2000 commercial-scale floating tidal turbine.
Scottish Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon visited the company’s prototype SR 250 (kW) tidal turbine in Kirkwall in the Orkneys last week.
“Ambitious clean-tech developers such as Scotrenewables Tidal Power, and the prototypes they are developing are testament to how far the marine renewables sector has progressed in just a few years,” she commented. “The Scottish Government is very pleased to be supporting these five exciting wave and tidal projects through this funding.”
She emphasised that the Scottish Government was supporting a range of different wave and tidal technologies at various stages of commercial development to stimulate as much innovation, investment and job creation as possible.
Other recipients include AWS Ocean Energy, which receives £3.9 million for its £15.6 million project to demonstrate its AWS-III wave energy convertor at full scale; Nautricity, which will use its £1.4 million grant to build and test its CoRMaT 500kW tidal turbine; Oceanflow Development, which gets £750,000 to put towards a £1.3 million project to build and test a prototype twin-turbine tidal energy converter, Evopod TE70; and AlbaTERN, which will get a £617,000 grant to deploy a demonstrator array of six SQUID 7.5kW wave energy converters.
“This continued support provides further endorsement of our technology and development approach and re-affirms Scotland as the place to make wave energy happen,” said chief executive of AWS, Simon Grey.
For further information:
www.scotland.gov.uk/
www.scottish-enterprise.com/
www.hie.co.uk/
www.scotrenewables.com/
www.awsocean.com/
www.nautricity.com/
www.oceanflowenergy.com/
albatern.co.uk/
Related stories:
Developers submit proposal for 1.5 GW Moray Firth wind projects (5-Sept)
Scottish renewables industry delivers £2.8 billion investment (13-Aug)
Scottish Government gives green light to 55 MW wind farm (13-Aug)
Marine Energy Park launches in Scottish waters (2-Aug)
Article source: http://www.energyefficiencynews.com/i/5347/
