Eco Wave Power Global AB, a leader in the production of clean electricity from ocean and sea waves, today, announces its intent to relocate the energy conversion unit from Gibraltar, after full overhaul, to AltaSea's premises in the Port of Los Angeles ("AltaSea"), in accordance with the agreement entered between the parties in January, 2022.
A range of factors led to the decision to move the energy conservation unit. The primary reason is Eco Wave Power's increasing interest in the US market, emphasized by the company's recent listing on Nasdaq Capital Market. Additional considerations include the condition of the Ammunition Jetty, and that Eco Wave Power has accumulated almost six years of operational experience with over 49,632 grid connection hours, in its Gibraltar pilot site, and is therefore ready to continue with its plan to expand to larger scales and new regions with its pioneering technology.
According to the agreement between Eco Wave Power and the Government of Gibraltar, the pilot was built and originally supposed to operate only for two years, with the purpose of proving that wave energy can safely connect to the grid and withstand the Gibraltar storms, using its storm-protection mechanism. However, the company decided to keep the pilot station operational for a longer time, as it was used as a real conditions research and development facility for the company.
Eco Wave deployed its first grid-connected commercial project in Gibraltar in 2016 and is at work on Israelâs first grid-connected wave energy installation. It also has a number of other projects planned, including a grid-connected 1 megawatt installation in Portugal that is part of a 20 megawatt agreement.
Sea-wave electricity plant heads to Port of Los Angeles
Israeli company Eco Wave Power www.ecowavepower.com is moving its wave energy pilot from Gibraltar to the 35-acre campus AltaSea ecofriendly business center at the Port of Los Angeles, the nationâs busiest seaport.
This will be the first US location for Eco Wave Powerâs energy conversion unit, which is already deployed in Israel and plans further deployments in Spain, Portugal and other locations.
According to the US Energy Information Administration, wave energy off the nationâs coasts can generate the equivalent of about 66 percent of all the electricity generated across the country in 2020.
Gibraltarâs decision to adopt legislation allowing wave power technology to be tested on the east side of the Rock served as an âimmediate catalystâ for other countries to do the same, according to the chief executive of Eco Wave Power, the Swedish-listed company behind the scheme.
Since launching its Gibraltar project in 2016 after signing a power purchase agreement with the Government of Gibraltar and the Gibraltar Electrical Authority, Eco Wave Power has initiated projects in countries including Portugal, Spain, Morocco, Israel and the US.
Inna Braverman, the founder and chief executive of Eco Wave Power, said one of the key challenges for testing and developing this type of technology is putting in place the legal frameworks allowing for electricity generated by waves to be channelled back into the grid.
âIt is interesting that once Gibraltar adopted legislation and enabled implementation of our wave energy technology, it served as an immediate catalyst for neighbouring jurisdictions to do the same,â Ms Braverman said.
âPortugal, Spain and Morocco are all countries that neighbour Gibraltar and have all entered different agreements with Eco Wave Power for the promotion of our pioneering technology in their respective countries.â
âI have always commented that one of the most significant barriers for the commercialisation of wave energy is lack of wave energy related regulations and legislation, and the case of Gibraltar makes me extremely optimistic, as I am seeing that a good project is 'contagious', and once we execute a project in one country, other countries will follow, thereby slowly removing this barrier.â
Eco Wave Power has since shipped the floater station it trialled in Gibraltar to the Port of Los Angeles, where it arrived last week and will be installed as a pilot scheme in the coming months.
The same technology is already deployed in the Port of Jaffa in Israel, from where it will send electricity from waves to the Israeli national electric grid for the first time in the countryâs history.
In Europe, Eco Wave Power is also setting up new projects.
In Portugal, after obtaining the licenses for the operation and grid connection of the first 1MW in the city of Porto from Direção-Geral de Energia e Geologia (DGEG), the company has retained the services of Efiki Partners to produce a social-economic report for its first 1MW, which will enable it to receive the final required license for the project from the Administração dos Portos do Douro, LeixÔes e Viana do Castelo once the report is completed to the satisfaction of all parties.
In Port Adriano in Spain, under a concession agreement entered into between the company and Port Adriano in April 2022, Eco Wave Power has commenced an in-depth feasibility study in the port.
Once the study is fully completed with favourable results, the parties will enter discussions regarding the licensing requirements and financial terms of a planned 2MW project.
In the interim, the port has been awarded an Innovation Award by the Port Authority of the Balearic Islands, recognising the best idea linked to technological progress that has been projected or implemented in any port of the Balearic Islands during this year.
The company has also signed a feasibility study agreement for a potential 1MW project in Morocco, to be finalised in the next few months.
The Moroccan project is expected to move forward upon favourable results from the feasibility study for the selected site.
The companyâs technology allows for arrays of floaters to be fixed to harbour and marina walls to harness the constant motion of the sea to generate electricity.
The company believes its technology creates the potential to tap thousands of miles of shoreline and utilise hundreds of thousands of breakwaters, jetties, piers, and other marine structures around the world to create clean, renewable, energy from the ocean.
Eco Wave Power is officially unveiling its onshore wave energy power station at public-private ocean institute AltaSea at the Port of Los Angeles tomorrow.
The AltaSea pilot project is the Israel-based Eco Wave Powerâs first in the United States, and it says it believes itâs the âfirst-ever onshore wave energy technology that will be deployed in the United States.â
Eco Wave Power, which produces clean electricity from ocean and sea waves, has modified, upgraded, and transported the unit to Los Angeles in just over a year. It arrived in December.
The company says its technology is easily transported or reproduced to meet the unique energy needs of a countryâs coastline.
