Good News from Mon, 15 February, 2010:

Fortum’s wave-power project receives a major grant from Sweden

Imagepark / Jukka Mähönen Fortum’s wave power project received significant support from the Swedish government.
The Swedish Energy Agency Energimyndigheten has given a 139 million kronor investment grant for the wave power project of Fortum and Seabsed Industry, which has been designed for Smögen in the municipality of Sotenäs in Sweden. The amount equals to 14 million euros, which is a significant part of the project’s total budget of 25 million euros.

The wave-power plant, which has been designed to utilise non-commercial technology, will be the world's largest full-scale plant with 420 interconnected units. The plant’s power output will be approximately 10 megawatts.

With the demonstration project, Fortum aims at developing wave power into a significant source of energy in Europe.

– The future looks promising if the technology can be developed to become reliable and competitive. Planning continues, and we are now awaiting permits from the Swedish Environmental Court and the EU. We have started planning for electrical grid connections and operating licence applications and hope for a speedy permit process, says Göran Hult, Senior Advisor at Fortum Power Division.

The purpose of the Swedish Energy Agency is to support and promote the development of commercially viable, renewable energy production through investment grants. The agency already supports four projects. Fortum and Seabased Industry's project is the fifth and final project of the programme.

Seabased Industry AB is an Uppsala-based company that develops new technology for capturing energy from sea waves. The company is closely associated with the research on wave power conducted at Uppsala University.

Fortum is also a shareholder of the Finnish AW Energy wave power company, which has a demonstration plant in Portugal.

www.fortum.com

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