Carnegie Wave Energy has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Western Australian government power utility Western Power to deliver a world first renewable energy island microgrid project.
The Garden Island Microgrid will consist of the Ceto 6 project currently in progress and the existing reverse osmosis desalination plant currently operating on Garden Island but will also add an additional 2MW peak of solar photovoltaic power generation and storage.
Carnegie chief executive officer Michael Ottaviano said: “Carnegie sees great potential to integrate its world leading Ceto wave technology into islands as well as fringe of grid applications wherever there is a strong wave resource.
“Western Australia presents itself as an attractive option to locate wave power projects in coastal communities and avoid building and maintaining long transmission lines.
“Additionally, Carnegie’s island power projects will invariably involve integrating Ceto with other renewable energy power sources, desalination plants, diesel generation and increasingly energy storage.”
Western Power CEO Paul Italiano said: “Western Power sees significant potential for long-term economic benefits in increasing the amount of decentralised energy generation located near the edges of the grid.
“We will provide engineering expertise to assess the technical challenges of enabling a two way flow of power between a large integrated network and a microgrid that has a mix of renewable sources of generation, including wave energy.”
Image: Carnegie’s Ceto 5 project (Carnegie)
