Tidal Energy Market Takes Off
It’s official, the tidal stream energy market has taken off with 11 companies awarded the CFD. Tidal energy can now start to play its valuable role in the renewable energy mix in a more predictable way and help with energy security and net zero targets.
QED Naval Ltd is celebrating the award of revenue support funding through the government’s CFD renewable incentive scheme as part of Auction Round 5 (AR5) yesterday, with the potential to generate £30m GVA over the next three years. Through its Welsh subsidiary Mor Energy Limited, who has been awarded 4.5MW, enough to power over 2,500 homes, at its Morlais site in North Wales, at a strike price of £198/MWh. QED Naval’s Morlais development is situated off the northwest coast of Holy Island and will have the capacity to power over 180,000 homes once fully operational.
We are delighted with this news and we would like to thank all our shareholders who have backed our vision and disruptive tidal technology (Subhub platform and Tocardo BV tidal turbines). This is a huge vote of confidence in the tidal stream energy sector and will allow us to move forward with our plans to develop the infrastructure and create skilled jobs in the supply chain. The revenue support announced today by the UK Government means that tidal energy can take its rightful place in the UK’s mainstream electricity supply – but for progress to be sustained it requires a clear policy framework, with continued ringfenced allowances.
South Stack lighthouse on Holy Island, Anglesey with the tidal race to the side.
We will be using QED’s next generation, industrial scale Subhub-ID tidal platform, which is capable of just over 1MW. This platform was developed as part of the EU Interreg TIGER project and has been well scrutinised using the OREC Technical Board of Consultants. QED have completed a comprehensive development program including tank testing to optimise the Subhub’s flow enhancing design and validation of its Tidal and Wave Energy Evaluation Toolset (TWEET) design tools. This includes performance and yield assessments using measured ADCP site data. QED have been working with the supply chain and prime contractor to build, assemble, commission and test and deploy the Subhub-ID platform from Holyhead.
Subhub-ID tank testing model at Flowave which was used to validate all our extreme loading and performance calculations.
This announcement is effectively a double win for QED Naval since its JV partner in Tocardo, Hydrowing, was also awarded 10MW of tidal capacity at Morlais. We have jointly developed the next generation Tocardo T3 tidal turbine. We will be going into production of this T3 turbine early next year to deliver over 40 turbine units to serve both projects. Both JV partners will work closely to collaborate on the development of both their blocks, which fortuitously, are next door to each other. Both companies will be sharing marine operations costs such as cable laying and deployment of their respective platforms as well as onshore facilities to minimise overheads.
QED Naval developed its Subhub tidal platform to make it quicker and easier to install tidal energy systems. Subhub has been shown to cut the costs of deploying and maintaining tidal stream turbines by up to 60% and improve yields by up to 48%.
Huge thanks to UK Marine Energy Council and Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult for representing the tidal sector and for their part in this massive news to the tidal sector. We also need to mention everyone at Menter Môn Morlais Ltd and Marine Energy Wales who have worked so hard for so long to provide a fully consented tidal site to deploy our Subhub tidal platform and Tocardo BV tidal turbines technology.
Model of the T3 tidal turbine that will be built in the UK.