SSE and Alstom Make Waves at Costa Head Project

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland) -- One of the world's largest planned marine energy projects, off the coast of Scotland, took a major step forward this week following the creation of a new joint venture.

French engineering company Alstom S.A. (EPA:ALO) (Paris, France) and SSE Renewables, part of Scottish and Southern Energy (PINK:SSEZY) (SSE) (Perth, Scotland), have teamed up to develop the Costa Head wave energy project. Located north of mainland Orkney, in The Crown Estate's Pentland Firth and Orkney Waters Strategic Area, it has a generating capacity of 200-megawatts (MW), making it the world's largest wave energy project under development, according to the partners.

Alstom and SSE Renewables will now apply for the permits necessary to start deploying the AWS-III wave energy converters from AWS Ocean Energy Ltd. (Inverness, Scotland), a company in which Alstom acquired a 40% equity share, in June last year. The AWS-III wave energy converter is a floating device with a rated power output of 2.5 MW. Testing of a 1:9 scale model of the device was carried out in Loch Ness in 2010 but full-scale component testing will commence this year. A full-scale prototype will be deployed at the European Marine Energy Centre in 2014.

The joint venture will develop an initial phase of around 10 MW, before moving on to install the full site capacity. The Costa Head site is located in water depths of 60 -- 75 meters, approximately 5 kilometres to the north of Orkney Mainland.

"We are delighted to announce our agreement with SSE Renewables, one of the leading developer of marine energy in the world, to develop Costa Head, which is the largest wave energy site being developed today in the world," said Jérôme Pécresse, President, Alstom Renewable Power and Senior Vice President, Alstom Hydro. "When completed, it will make a valuable contribution to the U.K.'s renewable energy targets."

SSE, with a variety of partners, is already developing half of the 1,600 MW of wave and tidal sites leased by the Crown Estate. Scotland awarded is first round of marine energy projects, comprising a mix of wave and tidal schemes, back in March 2010. For additional information, see March 18, 2010, article - Scotland Awards 1.2 Gigawatts of Marine Energy Projects.

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