Marine Scotland has given consent to Nautricity for the deployment of the first Contra Rotating Marine Turbine device, or CoRMaT, to be deployed in the Irish Sea. Work on the onshore connection is expected to start later this year with the devices being deployed in the water in early 2015. The turbines will be completely submerged and not visible from shore and they will have no measurable adverse impact on the marine environment.
CoRMaT, with its rotor span of 10 metres, is significantly larger than early test models. The device uses a novel, contra-rotating rotor system to cost-effectively harness tidal energy. While conventional tidal devices resemble wind turbines constructed on the seabed, incurring enormous deployment and engineering costs, it is lighter and more compact, tethered to the seabed and held in tension by a sub-surface float.
The turbines can be deployed in a range of water depths of up to several hundred meters deep. Because of their closely spaced, contra-rotating rotors moving in opposite directions, they remain steady in the face of strong tidal flows, allowing the device to “fly” from a simple tensioned mooring. This allows the device to maintain optimum alignment into the tidal flow as it varies its direction for maximum energy capture.
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