The marine foresight panel’s energies from the sea task force concluded that both wave and tidal stream have the potential to supply a major part of Britain's energy needs But how much power is there and how much of this power can realistically tapped? The resource is clearly large with the ETU estimating that 50TWh/year could be obtained offshore and 2.1TWh/year near shore HOW LARGE IS THE POTENTIAL WAVE ENERGY RESOURCE? Paul Nichols 24 th February 2005

WHAT ASSUMPTIONS TO ESTIMATE THE POTENTIAL ENERGY PRODUCED BY WAVE POWER? 1) Offshore projects will be the only commercially viable ones with near shore providing niche markets only 2) Pelamis will be the first commercially viable offshore technology due to the funding it has and its stage of development 3)The output of one pelamis will grow to 1MW and they will be installed in 30MW farms 4) Any future technologies brought onto the market will be at least as good as pelamis 5) The load factor for wave energy will be about 35% by 2050 but currently is 25%

WHAT ASSUMPTIONS TO ESTIMATE THE POTENTIAL ENERGY PRODUCED BY WAVE POWER? FURTHER ASSUMPTONS ABOUT THE PRODUCTION OF WAVE FARMS AND PRODUCTION TIME SCALE 2010: first commercial pelamis farm installed for testing 2015: first major wave farms developed 2020: more wave farms installed after success of first farms 2025: increased growth in pelamis farms as technology becomes mainstream and potential installation of other new technologies 2030: steady growth in wave farms to help meet renewable obligations

ESTIMATES OF NUMBER OF INSTALLED WAVE FARMS Using my assumptions I have created the following estimates of the number of wave farms that will be installed

OPTIMISTIC AND PESSEMISTIC ESTIMATES OF OUTPUT FROM WAVE POWER

conclusion Wave power over the next 25 years will become commercially viable and progress will be made in the development of wave farms The wave farms will produce a very small percentage of the renewables quota in the next 25 years but after the next 25 years they are likely to become a much larger player in renewable energy market as they will have gone through there initiation period where faults can be dealt with and many lessons learned The development of future wave farms though Is very reliant on funds to allow it to progress through the research and design stage and onto a commercial basis With the development of wave farms there is likely to be opposition from the shipping industry and potentially some environmental concerns about the habitats they are placed in However the environmental benefits of using wave power should not be underestimated