Nautricity’s tidal turbine up for retrieval

Scottish tidal energy developer Nautricity plans to retrieve its CoRMaT tidal turbine installed off Orkney next week.

The device, installed at the Fall of Warness grid-connected tidal energy test site of the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC), will be recovered in an operation set to begin on March 23, 2018.

The Glasgow-based tidal player has engaged marine renewables services provider Leask Marine to execute the retrieval using its C-Odyssey vessel.

After the recovery of the 500kW device from the seabed, it will be towed to nearshore Eday where diving operations will be performed.

Following the diving activities, the turbine will be towed to Hatston Pier in a recovery operation which is expected to be concluded by March 29, 2018.

CoRMaT is a contra-rotating turbine which uses two closely spaced dissimilar rotors, moving in opposite directions, to drive the rotor and rotating stator sections of an electrical generator.

As reported earlier, Nautricity installed the turbine at EMEC in April 2017 using Norwegian vessel Olympic Challenger for a trial period expected to last around 18 months.