Wave Hub takes up residence on the ocean floor

After seven years in the making and a series of last-minute delays, the South West Regional Development Agency (RDA) has finally installed its pioneering Wave Hub device off the north Cornish coast, further establishing the UK as the world's leading test centre for marine energy.

The final phase of deployment began on Friday, when cable-laying vessel Nordica lowered the 12-tonne socket onto the seabed.

Specialist contractor CTC Marine then spent the weekend positioning the device's four 300-metre cables, which serve the four berths that will allow prototype wave energy devices to transmit energy back to the mainland.

Ocean Power Technologies (OPT) has already signed up to plug its PowerBuoy wave energy converter into one of the berths and the RDA is currently in talks with a number of other marine energy developers about them using the test hub.

The news of the successful launch was welcomed by UK science minister David Willetts who said the project could help the UK become a leading exponent of marine energy, creating thousands of jobs in the coming decades.

"The UK is already leading the way with 25 per cent of the world's wave and tidal technologies being developed here," he said. "This is a huge opportunity for UK business – the sector could be worth £2bn by 2050 and it has the potential to create up to 16,000 jobs by 2040."

South West RDA's Wave Hub general manager Guy Lavender said that the facility would provide a major boost to the UK's wave-energy sector for years to come.

"Wave Hub will be on the seabed for the next 25 years, helping the world gain invaluable knowledge about how we tap the vast energy potential of our oceans in the pursuit of clean, abundant, renewable energy and cementing the UK’s position at the forefront of this green power revolution," he said.

The project faced a number of delays earlier this summer when equipment problems and weather conditions halted installation of the 25km cable from the device to the shore.

The Wave Hub device will now undergo a series of tests before the first marine energy device is deployed next year.