Tidal power plans for Alderney Race
PLANS to run a tidal power barrage between France and Alderney have been submitted to the French government.
Marine power generation company Atlantis is behind the idea, and it followed its own study which concluded that 2GW of energy could be harnessed in the Alderney Race (or Le Raz Blanchard, as it is known in France).
Its initial strategic plan suggests that 1GW of tidal power could be delivered by 2025, and this could be quickly expanded to produce 2GW by 2027.
The barrage of tidal turbines, if it went ahead, would run from the tip of the Cotentin Peninsula to Alderney.
Atlantis claimed that this will drive down the unit-cost of electricity over the lifetime of the tidal energy infrastructure – the Levelised Cost of Energy – to lower than that of any offshore wind farm currently being built in the UK or France.
The study concluded that the Race had one of the best tidal energy resources in the world, and Atlantis said that if implemented this would be the largest tidal power project in existence.
Its plan stated that the construction of the project would attract 3.3bn euro of investment and open up an export market worth an estimated 400m euro in annual turbine sales and potentially create 10,000 jobs.
‘France is sitting on a low-cost renewable energy gold mine at Le Raz Blanchard,’ said Atlantis CEO Tim Cornelius.
‘Now that the tidal stream industry has been through the R&D phase and is now entering full scale commercialisation, France should be at the forefront of exploiting this environmentally benign, predictable and inexhaustible source of renewable energy.
‘With the support of the French government, we can provide energy security, job creation, economic stimulation for the Normandy and Brittany regions along with the opportunity to lead Europe in the field of marine energy generation.’
The French government has commissioned its own studies to assess the best tidal power sites in French waters, and conclusions are expected in June.
