Orkney-based marine operator Leask Marine has been hired by the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) for cabling work at the Fall of Warness tidal test site.
Under the £66,000 contract, Leask Marine will be tasked with undertaking marine operations to prepare the existing submarine cable for the arrival of a new client to the site as part of the FORESEA program.
The operation will take place at the berth 2 of EMEC’s Fall of Warness grid-connected tidal test site, located west of the island of Eday in a narrow channel between the Westray Firth and Stronsay Firth.
The European Marine Energy Centre is a world-leading test facility for marine energy converters, offering two full-scale and two scaled tidal and wave test sites.
At the full-scale test sites, including the Fall of Warness site, there are subsea cables which run from each test berth at sea to a substation onshore where they meet the UK national grid.
The two scale test sites have been set up for testing smaller scale devices in less challenging conditions than those experienced at the full-scale test sites.
EMEC is one of the four European test centres participating in the €11 million EU initiative called FORESEA which aims to bring offshore renewable energy technologies to market faster by offering support to access a world-leading network of European test centers.
To date, the program has awarded 31 ‘recommendations for support’ for developers through three competitive calls for applications.
The fourth FORESEA call, ongoing until June 29, 2018, has been launched in October last year to help developers of offshore technologies transition into the renewable energy space by developing new applications for their products.