New Year Start For Tidal Project

Construction of a major tidal energy project in the Pentland Firth is set to begin this month, the developers have announced.Atlantis Resources, the majority owner of the MeyGen project, has successfully completed the conditions required to initiate its first drawdown from financial backers the Crown Estate, and Scottish Enterprise through the Renewable Energy Investment Fund.Meygen will utilise tidal technology tested at EMEC, the Orkney-based European Marine Energy Centre.Atlantis says the major construction and supply contractors have commenced design, engineering and procurement works in readiness for the start of construction at the Ness of Quoys project site in Caithness early in 2015. This will involve the building of the onshore infrastructure for connection to the electricity transmission grid for power export. The first power to the grid is expected in 2016.The company said: "We believe MeyGen is the largest planned tidal energy project in the world with a capacity of almost 400 megawatts (MW)."When fully completed, the project will include 269 turbines submerged on the seabed, generating enough power for almost 175,000 homes in Scotland."Atlantis is also involved in the development of a tidal energy project at the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia in Canada.Tim Cornelius, Atlantis's chief executive officer, added: "Having also reached financial close on the first phase of our MeyGen project in Scotland, we are building momentum on our projects around the world, realising our goal of bringing cost effective clean energy to market at commercial scale - on both sides of the Atlantic."
This feed was drawn from the ORKNEY RENEWABLES website