MANILA, Philippines — Scotland-based firm Nautricity will be introducing in the Philippines its second generation technology which will harness tidal resource for the generation of electricity.
The company will be joining a delegation from the United Kingdom which will be coming for a
business mission by the end of this month, primarily targeting investments in renewable energy.
According to UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) senior manager Fidel Ventura, British firms will be looking for opportunities in the Philippine RE sector – be it in the area of direct investments, engineering consultancy services or as technology providers.
The intent of Nautricity in promoting its technology, it was explained, will be “to make tidal energy economically competitive with traditional methods of electrical generation.”
At its current investment cost of $10 million per megawatt though, Ventura acknowledged that the technology is still expensive. But as it matures and its utilization widened, it is hoped that it will eventually go down and be aligned as competitive with other power generation technologies.
It has been noted that Nautricity’s CoRMaT tidal turbine “uses contra-rotating blades to suppress reactive torque, thus, allowing the turbine to be ‘flown’ from a tensioned mooring rather than installed on a tower built into the seabed.”
Its contra-rotating design also enables the elimination of gearboxes and reduces the mass of the generator. The technology is on pilot-test for projects in Scotland and London.
Apart from interests on RE ventures, the British government also earmarked 2.9 billion pounds (GBP) for financing climate change initiatives which may also be extended to developing countries, like the Philippines.
British Embassy climate change attaché Roslyn R. Arayata explained that the fund is being channeled through multilateral lending agencies, such as the Asian Development Bank and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank Group.
The Philippines, she added, has been a beneficiary of some of these funds via the Clean Technology Fund (CTF) of the multilateral lending agencies. In these, qualified green projects may avail of financing from the climate change fund pooled mostly by contributor-developed countries.
The embassy similarly announced that it will be holding series of events promoting renewable energy, sustainable infrastructure and low emission transportation, which will be aptly anchored on the UK government’s aspiration for a “green growth.” The theme revolves on: ‘Climate Change Solutions: Advancing Low Carbon Business’.
“The events will be attended by business leaders and experts including British business delegations, representatives of local government units and non-government organizations,” embassy officials said.
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