UK Wave and Tidal Energy Strategic Areas Project – January Update

This briefing is designed to give you a high level update on the progress of The Crown Estate’s UK Wave and Tidal Energy Strategic Area identification project in two parts; the development of the strategic areas and our engagement with stakeholders to date. The key points are:

 The project focus is on assessing areas of sea which are suitable for wave and tidal energy development and includes considerations of resource and other technical parameters in order to identify strategic areas. The outputs of this project are to inform our internal thinking about how to best manage the resources we have responsibility for, just as we do for marine minerals and offshore wind energy.

 This project is neither part of an immediate plan to lease further sites, nor should it imply that The Crown Estate we will be leasing further sites imminently. It is addressing the spatial potential to lease at commercial scale only and not looking into the appropriate timing to lease at commercial scale; this is for later discussion, informed by the spatial analysis

 Using MaRS (our Marine Resource System) and through collaborative work with statutory planners, the project is now at a stage in which we have initial development potential models for both wave and tidal energy. We are currently in the process of refining these models further to ensure that they represent a robust technical strategic view of wave and tidal potential within UK waters. Further detail is outlined in the download below.

 We have also been working actively with other stakeholders who we believed would be interested in the project, including by asking them to share relevant data with us. Box 2 gives details.

 The project is on track to complete at the end of March 2012 following which outputs and intended use of outputs will be communicated.

To download the update in full click here UK Strategic Areas Project Briefing – Jan 2012 FINAL