Eco Wave Power (EWP) Global, a publicly traded onshore wave energy company, has won a £1.5 million grant as part of a consortium led by Toshiba (U.K.) and Aquatera (U.K.) to design a pilot microgrid project for a remote island in Thailand.

The £1.5 million grant is part of Innovate UK’s Energy Catalyst program Round 10, which supports U.K. and international businesses and organizations in developing market-focused technologies that provide clean, affordable and accessible energy. 

The consortium is led by Toshiba Europe Ltd. and Aquatera Ltd., and includes Hitachi Energy Ltd. and teams from the University of Manchester, the University of Exeter, the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT), and the Queen Mary University of London. The consortium will utilize the onshore wave energy converters (WECs) developed by EWP and implement advanced technology developed by the corporate partners and the university teams.

New technology to be developed as part of the project will include the development and deployment of:

• • novel and predictive control systems
  • a radar system to forecast wave heights to help avoid hazardous conditions and maximize WECs’ energy generation
  • a fully AI-based load and generation prediction system
  • wireless, distributed energy management system to provide electricity without expensive lithium-ion batteries

The Thai electrical state enterprise, the Provincial Electricity Authority, will act as the microgrid operator on the island and minimize the capital cost of electricity to provide an electricity tariff, as inexpensive as monthly mobile charges, without incurring any asset ownership and maintenance costs for residents.

Aquatera, in close collaboration with AIT, will be active in seeking further private and public investment for similar pilot projects in Thailand’s islands and neighboring Southeast Asian countries with excellent potential for wave energy pilots.

Learn more here.