RenewableUK, the trade association for the wind, wave and tidal energy industries, has welcomed the opening yesterday of Scotland’s first Marine Energy Park (MEP).
The Pentland Firth and Orkney Waters MEP is the first in Scotland, and the second in the UK, following the announcement of an Energy Park in the South West of England earlier this year. The Park provides a dedicated space for companies to test and develop their projects. The Pentland Firth and Orkney waters MEP includes the largest wave and tidal development zone in the world, with the Crown Estate having awarded licenses worth 1.6GW to developers to take forward projects there. The area will also remain key to the testing of devices, as it includes the European Marine Energy Centre. Since its creation in 2003, EMEC has ensured that developers can deploy prototypes, and determine what more work needs to be done before installing them commercially. EMEC is currently testing nine devices.
The UK is ideally placed to benefit from wave and tidal energy with the potential for 20% of power to be delivered by marine resources by 2050, the equivalent of 8 coal-fired power stations. UK manufacturers and those from across the world are keen to make the most of this resource with 46 different wave and tidal devices currently under development in the UK. This is significantly more than any other country in the world, reflecting the fact that the UK has around 50% of Europe’s tidal energy resource.
The opening comes after last week’s announcement that wave and tidal revenue support, under the Renewables Obligation Certificate system will more than double for the period 2013-2017 from current levels.
Commenting on yesterday’s announcement, David Krohn, RenewableUK Wave and Tidal Development Manager said: “We’re delighted to see the Government building on the enormous prestige of EMEC and creating another dedicated zone around it for wave and tidal developers to take forward their projects. Marine energy is a key facet to ensuring energy security for the UK over future decades and has the potential to create 10,000 jobs by 2020. Coupled with last week’s announcement around revenue support, the Government is showing that the UK is open for business to exploit stunning marine resources. Work needs to continue to build up the industry so that it can achieve sufficient volume to reduce costs over the longer term, but this is another important step along the path”.
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Offshore WIND staff, July 31, 2012