A company developing technology to harness energy from ocean waves is considering establishing a production facility in Rhode Island, despite federal regulatory hurdles that have delayed its pilot project in Rhode Island for more than two years.
The R.I. Office of Energy Resources is developing a funding formula and negotiating a deal to jumpstart Deep River, Conn.-based Energetech America’s stalled test of its electricity generator in state waters and make Rhode Island a production hub for the company, said Andrew C. Dzykewicz, Gov. Donald L. Carcieri’s chief energy adviser.
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Dzykewicz said he hoped that Energetech, a subsidiary of Energetech Australia Pty, of Sydney, would be manufacturing its wave energy electricity generators within a year at the Quonset Business Park or in the Port of Providence.
“We think we can do not only [Energetech’s] pilot here in Rhode Island but also a commercial project,” he said. “We think we can get them to build these things here for the entire East Coast.”
The state’s attempt to woo Energetech comes during a time of increased worldwide interest in fledgling wave-energy technology, amid high oil prices and concerns about global warming. The ocean contains energy capable of generating more than 5,000 times the world’s current power usage, according to Energetech.
In the fall of 2004, the state’s energy office pledged $241,000 to fund Energetech’s $3.5 million project to test the commercial viability of its generator at a breakwater about 6,000 feet off the shore of Point Judith.
Energetech spent $141,628 of funds pledged by Rhode Island on environmental testing, contracting the work to researchers at the University of Rhode Island, said Betsy Macmillan, a project engineer for Energetech America.
But the pilot project stalled in late 2005, when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission told Energetech its project was subject to the Federal Power Act and would be regulated as a hydroelectric facility – requiring a permitting process the company said would cost up to $2 million and take as many as two years to go through. Energetech’s efforts in Rhode Island have been on hold ever since, but the company has marched on elsewhere.
Energetech Australia successfully completed its first permanent installation of a wave-energy electricity generator last December in Sydney. The company is planning or already operating projects in Hawaii, Vancouver, Mexico, South Africa, Spain, Mauritius and Namibia, Macmillan said.
But Energetech is hopeful that recent negotiations with Dzykewicz would revive the company’s pilot project in Rhode Island, Macmillan said. And because the company’s technology has advanced significantly in the past couple of years, a pilot project “might be close to a commercial project by the time we get there,” she said.
“I think the chances are pretty good,” she said. “The technology has proven itself in Sydney, Australia. The funding was a problem, but working with Andy [Dzykewicz], that might not be a problem anymore.”
Dzykewicz and Macmillan declined to discuss the particulars of their negotiations. But the deal would probably include a greater funding commitment from the state in return for a pledge to locate an Energetech production facility in Rhode Island, Dzykewicz said.
Macmillan said Quonset Point’s location and facilities would make it an ideal manufacturing and shipping location for Energetech.
“The Quonset Point area is a big area for shipbuilding, which kind of lends itself to building the structure there, so I think the chances are very good,” she said. “It’s got like 33-feet depth at the piers, which is very helpful to launch this project and get it floated out to where it needs to go.”
But if it happens at all, Energetech might not conduct its pilot project in Narragansett, as it initially planned – in part because the company has since learned its generators work better in deeper water than is available off the shore of Point Judith, Macmillan said.
“It’s another reason we’ve stepped back,” she said. “We don’t want to do any more environmental work before we have a better idea of the best place to put it.”
