Atlantis' MeyGen wins GBP-1.5m grant for tidal turbine connection hub

SIMEC Atlantis Energy Ltd (LON:SAE) has won a GBP-1.545-million (USD 1.85m/EUR 1.68m) government grant to develop a subsea tidal turbine connection hub for the next phase of its flagship 398-MW MeyGen tidal power project.

The grant comes from the Scottish government's GBP-10-million Saltire Tidal Energy Challenge Fund, which supports the commercial deployment of tidal energy generation in Scottish waters.

Atlantis will use the fresh funding to design, procure, install, connect and commission the subsea hub along with the associated subsea connection infrastructure. It noted that by connecting multiple turbines to a single export cable it will achieve cost reductions in power production.

The company’s turbine and engineering services division will now get a GBP-2.4-million engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for delivery and installation of the hub by the MeyGen project company. The hub itself will be installed later in 2020.

Atlantis will make the hub available to project developers once proven, to help drive a cost-competitive commercial deployment across the sector, it said. According to CEO Tim Cornelius, in addition to tidal power, the hub’s direct application will also be possible for other forms of marine energy, including floating wind and wave energy.

“The next phase of MeyGen, which will supply ocean energy to a large data centre to be built in Scotland, requires us to deliver cost competitive energy to our future customers and the use of subsea hubs to reduce the number of export cables required to deliver this power from the 40 x 2MW turbines we plan to install is central to our plans,” Cornelius added.

(GBP 1.0 = USD 1.194/EUR 1.090)

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