Tidal Power: Investment
(asked on 16th October 2024) - View Source
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what plans he has to invest in tidal power.
Answered by
Michael Shanks
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The UK possesses tremendous tidal resource and could play a role in balancing the intermittency of wind and solar generation as we transition towards a carbon-neutral power sector.
The UK remains the world leader in tidal stream generation technologies, with around half of the world's operational deployment of this situated in UK waters. On 3rd September 2024, the Government announced that six tidal stream contracts were secured with a joint capacity of 28MW in Contracts for Difference Allocation Round 6. The UK is on track to have over 130 MW of tidal stream capacity deployed by 2029.
The Government is also open to considering well-developed proposals for harnessing the tidal range energy in the bays and estuaries around our coastlines, including barrage schemes and other alternatives.