Grant aid of £153,000 has been awarded to Pure Marine Gen Ltd, a Belfast based company, to accelerate the development of its wave energy converter. The grant award, announced yesterday (25th March), was made by the UK government's Carbon Trust organization.

The funding, says the company, will be used to conduct mathematical modelling, carry out an iterative series of tank tests and produce design drawings for a prototype. In the longer term, Pure Marine plans to develop devices with a capacity of over 2MW which, deployed in large arrays, could have generating capacity of over 500MW, comparable with a small coal-fired power plant. A techno-economic analysis which also forms part of the project will provide a projection of energy costs from the device and a route map for further cost reductions.

The Carbon Trust is currently on the lookout for other technologies with significant carbon saving potential to receive up to £500k of grant funding through its Applied Research scheme. Three open calls are run each year and the deadline for the current one is 16th April 2009 at 5pm. Applications can be made at www.carbontrust.co.uk/appliedresearch.

Mark Williamson, Director of Innovations at Carbon Trust, said: "Pure Marine Gen's DUO WEC design addresses the major challenge facing the growing marine energy industry – how to produce more energy at a lower cost. The UK's marine energy sector is world-leading and by supporting innovative designs such as the DUO WEC the Carbon Trust is working to accelerate an industry which has huge economic and job creation potential."

Dr Paul Brewster of Pure Marine Gen said: "The Carbon Trust's support has helped us expand our Engineering team and work with a wider range of engineering specialists, which has fast tracked the development of the DUO WEC wave energy technology. In addition to our DUO WEC research projects, we have identified the best sites for deploying wave energy technology. The increased productivity benefits of the DUO WEC will enable us to capitalise on harnessing the ocean's huge, untapped, indigenous renewable energy resources."