Part of the SSE energy group, Scottish Hydro Electric Transmission, announced that they will delay the grid connection between Orkney and Shetland until 2018, reports BBC.
This announcement raises questions over the Scottish government’s Saltire Prize which was created to accelerate the commercial development of wave and tidal energy technology. This competition will run from 2015 to 2017.
Since many companies focused on the Orkney and the Pentland Firth area, they will face grid connection problems since the grid upgrade will come one year after the competition ends.
The company’s director of transmission, David Gardner, added: “In addition, the Orkney link is challenged by further changes to the onshore landing arrangements and environmental constraints, which impacted on the proposed cable routing.”
Niall Stuart, chief executive of industry body Scottish Renewables , said: “This is of course disappointing news for those projects that will be delayed as a result of the new timescales for delivery. However, it is perhaps not surprising that such a huge programme of upgrades and new connections will take longer than originally expected.”
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Offshore WIND staff, December 25, 2012; Image: spr