Introduction
The Marine Renewables Proving Fund is a £22.5m grant scheme
which has proven that full-scale marine energy devices can be
installed and operated in open-sea environments. The fund is
managed by the Carbon Trust on behalf of the Department of Energy
and Climate Change and provides funding and technical support to
six full-scale prototypes.
Final participants in the MRPF were selected via a technical and
financial evaluation of applications from 31 different developers
following an open call competition. Leading technology developers
with robust plans for building, installing and operating a
full-scale prototype were chosen, receiving an average grant of
over £3 million. The Carbon Trust recruited a Technical Services
Team, which provided technical due diligence for the funder but
also supported the project teams and has facilitated the sharing of
learnings between participants.
All six full-scale prototypes will have been installed and
generating by the end of the 2012 Summer weather window, a
significant success in an industry where technical delays are
common and expected. The success reflects a significantly hands on
approach to the disbursements of funds by the Carbon Trust, and
strong technical understanding of the technical and milestone
changes that are part and parcel of technology demonstration.
The six fully installed devices are central to the increasing
confidence of the marine energy industry, which now plans to scale
up demonstration to arrays of several MW and is seeing increased
private sector investment from strategically placed industrial
companies.
Marine Renewables Proving Fund Developers
After detailed appraisal of thirty one applications, the six
developers selected for support under the MRPF are:
- Aquamarine Power
- Atlantis Resources Corporation
- Hammerfest Strom UK
- Marine Current Turbines
- Pelamis Wave Power
- Voith Hydro Ocean
Aquamarine power -
Oyster 1 prototype at EMEC
Aquamarine Power (wave device) - MRPF grant of £4.66M awarded
towards the design, fabrication and installation of a full scale,
grid connected 800kW Oyster 800 demonstration device with high
pressure pipelines to onshore hydroelectric equipment; planned
deployment 2011.
More information: Aquamarine Power
website.
Atlantis Resources Corporation
Atlantis (tidal device) - MRPF grant of £1.85M awarded towards
the development of the design and manufacture of a 1MW nacelle,
next generation blades, control systems, gravity based sub
structure and design of a rotate unit for deployment mid-2011.
More information: Atlantis website.
Hammerfest Strom UK
Hammerfest Strom UK (tidal device) - MRPF grant of £4.27M
awarded towards the design and manufacture of the HS-1000, a 1MW,
gravity based, three bladed tidal device for deployment
mid-2011.
More information: Hammerfest
website.
Marine Current Turbines
MCT (tidal device) - MRPF grant of £2.15M awarded towards the
enhancements to drive train and control systems, design and
fabrication of next generation blades including blade root
interface and funding of the operation of SeaGen (1.2MW twin
nacelle tidal device). In addition, to carry out preliminary
environmental monitoring of an array site.
More information: MCT website.
Pelamis Wave Power
Pelamis (wave) - MRPF grant of £4.89M awarded towards the
development, construction, commissioning, sea trials, deployment,
operation and maintenance of the full scale grid connected
device.
More information: Pelamis Wave Power
website.
Voith Hydro Ocean Current Technologies
Voith (tidal device) - MRPF grant of £1.90M awarded towards the
design and construction of the 1MW EMEC 1 tidal device including
installation of the monopile in preparation for deployment of the
fixed nacelle with bi-directional blades; deployment of monopile
mid-2011.
More information: Voith website.
All work programmes are in their close-out phase under the
MRPF.
View further information on the Aid Scheme under
which the grant funding is provided.