Celtic Sea Power seeking environmental review for Pembrokeshire Demonstration Zone

March 9, 2022, by Ajsa Habibic

Wave Hub Development Services, trading as Celtic Sea Power, has issued a tender seeking environmental and scoping review services for the Pembrokeshire Demonstration Zone (PDZ) offshore Wales.

Pembroke Port (Courtesy of Port of Milford Haven)

The PDZ is a wave energy site located off the South Pembrokeshire coastline. The zone comprises a 90-square kilometre area of the seabed with water depths of approximately 50 metres and a wave resource of 19 kW/m.

It has the potential to support the demonstration of wave arrays with a generating capacity of up to 30MW for each project.

The project has secured funding up to the end of June 2023 to develop the PDZ and inform the next stage of the development pathway, securing the consents, discharging conditions, and working to finalise the investment for the capital build.

Now, Celtic Sea Power is seeking professional environmental services support in five key areas. These include:

Review of the 2018 scoping report and NRW, PCC and PCNPA responses against the revised project scope and consultation with NRW through DAS;
Budget and timeline for EIA scope;
Updated constraints maps;
Support in making sure the content in the EIA and Environmental survey tender is appropriate; and
Ad hoc support for a call off.

The deadline for receipt of completed tenders has been set for 25 March 2022.

The demonstration zone is part of the Pembroke Dock Marine programme whose sponsor is Pembrokeshire County Council and project delivery partners include Port of Milford Haven, Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult and Marine Energy Wales.

According to developers, the programme will be a world-class marine energy and engineering centre of excellence for design, test, build and deployment of marine energy devices, with potential for use by other industries.

It will expand upon the region’s established facilities and extensive skill base to maximise operational efficiency and increase innovation to drive down the cost of marine energy – an industry projected to be worth £76 billion by 2050. 