Scottish company looks to team wave and wind power

Scottish renewables firm Green Ocean Energy hopes to have a working prototype of a 500KW wave power machine that could be fitted to the base of offshore wind turbines by 2010.

The company says the economics of both machines are enhanced as infrastructure such as the foundation and cabling can be shared.

The Wave Treader system has two arms that extend either side of a fixed structure which lifts and falls with the waves, driving hydraulic fluid.

The hydraulic fluid spins hydraulic motors and then electric generators. The arms can rotate to face waves coming from any direction, and have a 25-year lifespan.

The device is primarily aimed at round-three offshore wind turbines which tend to be further offshore and in more vigorous wave environments than round one and two machines.

The project adapts the technology of the firm's standalone wave energy generator, known as Ocean Treader.

The company was able to develop the device after securing £60,000 of funding from npower’s Juice fund.

Andrew Garran of wind power consultancy Garrad Hassan told the World Future Energy Summit last month that teaming up offshore wind devices with wave and tidal ones made perfect sense.

"You have the infrastructure there, you have the generator and the cabling – but nobody is doing it at the moment," he said.