Australian Navy scopes out wave energy potential

Australia may have finally found a use for its huge wave energy resources besides surfing. Carnegie Wave Energy has announced it is to build the country's first commercial-scale wave energy plant after deciding on a location adjacent to a naval base south of Perth, on the country's west coast.

Carnegie will install the first of its underwater units at Garden Island next year, and will install another 25 to 30 such units to take the installed capacity to 5MW, making the development the largest wave energy plant in the world, according to chief executive Michael Ottaviano.

The A$50m (£28.03m) project is being supported by a A$12.5m grant from the Western Australia state government, but Carnegie has hopes to build larger facilities along the wave-rich southern coast of Australia in coming years.

However, those developments will depend on further government support, with an application for funding to help a proposed 50MW development expected to be announced soon.

Carnegie also announced on Friday that it had also been asked to conduct a feasibility study to provide energy to another naval base near Exmouth, about 1,000km to the north. The base is located on an island and is off-grid, currently relying on expensive diesel generators for energy.

Ottaviano said off-grid island locations with good wave resources represent a potentially lucrative market for the company.

The company's CETO technology involves a series of six-metre-high underwater buoys tethered to pump units on the sea bed. High pressure water is then delivered to conventional hydro-electric turbines on shore.

Ottaviano said the capital costs of the initial project will be high – about A$10m per MW, but he predicted they will come down by around 30 per cent for larger projects before falling further as the company expands. He added that in the long term he expects the technology to be fully competitive with wind energy.

Carnegie currently has a pilot project with a small-scale example of its technology operating at Fremantle. The Garden Island installation will generate its first revenue.

Ottaviano also revealed that the company is currently competing with at least two other Australian developers for funding support for another large-scale development project. He said that if the application for funding is not successful the company will look to develop a large-scale project elsewhere, with the UK a possible destination because of its strong incentives for wave energy.