Two Cornish companies have won an international contract to work on a multi-million pound project to develop a floating wind turbine at Wave Hub, the offshore renewable energy test facility.
The Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) confirmed earlier this year that Wave Hub had been chosen as its preferred location to develop, build and test a floating offshore wind turbine to investigate whether floating wind farms could play a cost-effective role in meeting the UK’s energy needs.
Now two Cornish companies – Marine contractor and vessel owner Keynvor MorLift Ltd (KML) and Penryn-based offshore drilling specialist LDD – have been chosen by lead contractor The Glosten Associates to work on an installation study for the pioneering project.
Wave Hub, which is a grid-connected offshore renewable energy test facility ten miles off the north coast of Cornwall near Hayle, could host the project as early as 2015, and it would remain in place for between eight and ten years.
Wave Hub managing director Claire Gibson said: “We are delighted that KML and LDD have been chosen by Glosten to work on this innovative floating wind project at Wave Hub.
“It is testimony to the experience we have in the marine engineering sector in Cornwall that two local companies have successfully collaborated to win this essential work, in a competitive global marketplace.”
The two companies have been appointed as part of a £4 million Front End Engineering Study commissioned and funded by the ETI which is expected to be completed by the end of the year.
The ETI will then decide whether to invest up to £21 million in the construction and deployment of the demonstrator project which would occupy one of Wave Hub’s four berths.
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