West Perth-based clean energy developer Carnegie Corporation Ltd has launched a $10 million capital raising ahead of the development of its first large-scale commercial wave energy demonstration plant in Australia.
West Perth-based clean energy developer Carnegie Corporation Ltd has launched a $10 million capital raising ahead of the development of its first large-scale commercial wave energy demonstration plant in Australia.
The Australian Securities Exchange listed company, which is the exclusive licensee of Alan Burns’ CETO wave energy technology in the Southern Hemisphere, is just months away from finalising a site for its $500 million, 50 megawatt wave farm and power plant.
It hopes to commence construction in 2009, with first delivery of electricity in 2011.
Carnegie managing director Michael Ottaviano said the company was currently assessing two potential sites, Portland in Victoria and Pt Lincoln in South Australia, which could supply the national electricity market.
The town of Binningup in the state’s South West, is also high on the list, with plans for a smaller scale 5MW facility to be co-located at the proposed Southern Seawater Desalination Plant.
The Water Corporation has called for 20 per cent of its 200 gigawatt hours per year of the plant’s renewable energy requirement to be sourced from technology not yet commercially proven on a large scale, such as wave power.
The facility could be expanded to supply greater amounts of electricity, and also has the potential to supply the plant with high pressure seawater, which is brought ashore through a pump in the energy generation process.
Dr Ottaviano said wave power was one of the only zero emissions technology with the ability to provide base load power, with provision of the energy resource almost 100 per cent reliable.
CETO is different to wave power systems developed overseas in that it is the only system to be fully submerged, requires only two metres of swell to operate effectively, and generates both power and freshwater.
Dr Ottaviano said the southern part of Australia was one of the best places in the world for wave farms.
Once the technology is commercially proven in Australia, Carnegie will look at other potential sites in New Zealand, Chile and South Africa.
“The potential for the Southern Hemisphere is huge. Australia could easily have 10 to 20 operating in the next decade,” Dr Ottaviano said.
In addition to CETO, Carnegie is also developing Cleaner Coal Power technology, which generates electricity at significantly higher thermal efficiencies than existing technologies, leading to lower greenhouse emissions.
Dr Ottaviano said investor interest in renewable and clean energy had gathered pace in the past 12 to 18 months, with Carnegie’s latest capital raising attracting significant interest from both institutional and retail investors.
