Tidal turbine installed by Irish firm

Using a specially built twin-hulled barge, OpenHydro deployed the subsea base and the open centre turbine on the seabed at the Europen Marine Energy Centre (Emec) off the coast of Orkney, Scotland.

“Being able to deploy tidal turbines in this manner turns a difficult and lengthy project of many months into a quick and cost-efficient single-day operation,” said Brendan Gilmore, chairman of OpenHydro.

“It is another major step forward in our technology development programme towards commercial tidal farms that produce energy at a highly economic cost.”

According to the company it’s turbine converts the movement of the water directly into electricity.

No part of the structure is visible from the surface and the equipment is deep enough that it will not interfere with shipping traffic.

The turbine was deployed from the OpenHydro Installer – a custom built barge believed to be the first built specially for deploying tidal turbines.