What steps is the Welsh Government taking to support the development of tidal turbine projects, following the news that a turbine in Orkney has enough capacity to meet the annual electricity demand of around 2,000 UK homes?
The greatest barrier to accelerating development of wave and tidal projects is the lack of meaningful revenue support through the UK Government financial mechanisms such as their Contracts for Difference (CfD). We have called on the UK Government to rethink their policy on funding these very promising technologies by providing a dedicated pot within their CfD auction rounds.
In the meantime, the Welsh Government continues its strong support for a range of marine technologies, including tidal stream technologies. A strong supportive policy is provided within our Welsh National Marine Plan (WNMP) and the Offshore Renewable Energy Programme (OREP) will ensure fit for purpose advice and guidance is available and marine licensing supports the deployment of marine renewable energy projects wherever possible in line with marine planning policy.
We have also provided European funding to support the industry to develop and test their technologies in Welsh waters, including £7.8m to Morlais, a Menter Môn project aiming to develop a tidal stream demonstration zone off the coast of Holy Island, Anglesey and over £29m to tidal stream developers to support pre-commercial development and deployment of their devices.
We are now considering how to support tidal stream developers and other marine energy projects to get more devices in the water to both generate carbon-free electricity and move more quickly to full commercial deployments.