A pilot test of a wave-energy generator off the shore of Narragansett will not begin on schedule, because the project is running into regulatory issues at the federal level.
Energetech America, of Deep River, Conn., had planned to begin trials this year of a generator that makes electricity from the up-and-down movement of waves. The company initially had aimed to get permits for testing from the Army Corps of Engineers and state environmental authorities, but the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has claimed jurisdiction over the project, saying the company needs its approval before testing begins.
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“It has delayed our plans, because we’ve been trying to figure out how this affects our project,” said Betsy McMillan, a project manager for Energetech. She added that the company must weigh the costs of gaining a license from the FERC in deciding whether the project in Rhode Island is still financially feasible.
The company – a subsidiary of Energetech Australia Pty of Sydney – announced the $3.5 million project in September 2004. State agencies from Rhode Island, Connecticut and Massachusetts chipped in a total of $1 million toward the effort.
Plans were to submerge a 500-kilowatt generator – able to provide electricity to 300 households – on the seaward side of a breakwater at Point Judith, about 6,000 to 8,000 feet from the shoreline, according to documents filed with the FERC. Ocean scientists from the University of Rhode Island were to study the commercial viability of the system.
Energetech filed plans with the FERC seeking regulatory guidance in July 2005, McMillan said, because the company was unsure how its new technology would be governed under existing state and federal laws.
The bad news came last October. The FERC told Energetech its project was subject to the Federal Power Act and would be regulated as a hydroelectric facility, because it uses U.S. navigable waters to generate power and hooks into the grid.
Carolyn Elefant, a lawyer and legislative director for the Ocean Renewable Energy Coalition, a Potomac, Md.-based group that promotes wave energy, said the FERC licensing process would cost $1 million to $2 million – more than some small projects, such as Energetech’s, can afford.
“The problem with the FERC process is, it can be very costly,” said Elefant, who had noted that fact in a December 2005 letter to the agency, responding to the FERC’s decision to take jurisdiction over Energetech’s project.
The advocate said the FERC process would involve several federal agencies, including the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and would require Energetech to pay for costly studies to gauge the project’s potential impact on water quality and any existing fish species.
FERC has granted short-term permits for tidal energy projects testing new technology, Elefant said, but only under conditions which would be difficult for Energetech to meet.
One condition has been that the projects may not function as energy generators, charging utilities for the electricity they transfer into the power grid.
Another has been that the projects must compensate the utility for any power their experimental projects displace from the grid that was generated by a licensed power plant.
Elefant called this a “nutty” concept. FERC spokeswoman Celest Miller, however, said the agency “takes its direction from congress” and applies the law equally to all hydropower projects.
But for the wave-energy project proposed in Rhode Island, it’s also a costly proposition. Energetech’s McMillan said the test generator would produce nearly $200,000 worth of electricity, so her company would have to pay that amount to comply with the FERC’s utility “displacement” condition.
Under pressure to amend its policies on wave energy, the FERC plans to hold a conference Dec. 6 in Washington, D.C., to “get an assessment of the type of technology the developers are considering for [wave-energy] projects … that we haven’t encountered significantly in the past,” said spokesman Bryan Lee.
There are 11 projects seeking FERC permits to put tidal energy generators in Alaska, Maine, New York, New Hampshire and Oregon, according to agency records. “For lack of a better term,” Lee said, “there’s been a land rush of [companies] interested in developing wave energy.”
Why? Energetech says “ocean wave energy represents a largely untapped global resource,” estimated to produce more than five times the world’s annual energy usage, according to documents filed with the FERC.
“My opinion is that [wave energy] is just too good a technology to get caught up in a bureaucratic morass,” said Andrew C. Dzykewicz, chief energy advisor to Gov. Donald L. Carcieri and head of the R.I. Office of Energy Resources.
The state’s energy office has pledged $242,000 to fund the Energetech project at Point Judith, and had already paid out about half that sum as of last week.
“We’re going to be supporting [Energetech] in their efforts” to gain approval for the project, Dzykewicz said. The state energy chief added that he plans to write a letter to the FERC, seeking to persuade the agency to change its position on the licensing matter.
“We’re hopeful that this is not going to be the $1 million to $2 million permitting process,” Dzykewicz said, “and that FERC will decide that it does not have jurisdiction.”