pepei.pennnet.com
25 August 2009
Ocean Energy has announced it has successfully concluded 2.5 years of testing on a system for generating electricity from wave power. The Cork-based firm has been testing a prototype of the system that it has developed in an area off the west coast of Ireland. The company said the successful completion of the trials meant that it could now proceed with the next stage of developing its system commercially.
Each individual unit can produce up to 2 MW of electricity, and Ocean Energy has estimated that this is enough to provide power to 1400 homes for a year. The 28-tonne, quarter-scale test device was initially launched for sea trials in November 2006, and has been tested on a government test site, close to Spiddal, in Galway Bay, since December 2006.
The system has been generating electricity, which has been fed into the national grid from a connection point close to the test bed. Chief executive John McCarthy told the Irish Times that the company believes it is the first in the world to have successfully concluded tests over such a period of time. He added that if it is developed successfully the technology could create up to 20 000 jobs in this country, and has the potential to boost export earnings.
Ocean Energy is one of a number of Irish and Irish-linked firms working on the development of this technology. The others include Wavebob, which has also been testing equipment off the west coast of Ireland, and Aquamarine Power, which has been working on developing a system in Scotland.
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