Ocean energy in Europe: assessing support instruments and cost-reduction needs

The SET-Plan declaration of intent for ocean energy has set ambitious targets for wave and tidal energy technologies. Tidal technologies are expected to reach a levelised cost of energy (LCOE) of 15 cEUR/kWh by 2025. In order to meet this target, technology costs need to be reduced of about 75 % from 2016 values Cost-reduction of tidal technologies is expected to go in hand with increased technology deployment and further technology validation gained by the operation of first-of-a-kind tidal farms. In this paper we assess the learning investment needed to support the cost-reduction of tidal energy to meet the 2025 SET-Plan targets. The learning investment necessary to bring tidal energy to cost-competitiveness would be of about 1.45 billion EUR, requiring about 3.15 GW of installed capacity to achieve the LCOE target of 15 cEUR/KWh. Supporting the step growth for the sector requires the design of accompany policies aimed at the industrialisation of the sector to support the creation of assembly and manufacturing facilities.

MAGAGNA Davide;  MONFARDINI Riccardo;  UIHLEIN Andreas; 

2017-12-04

UCC

JRC108136

2309-1983,   

http://www.ewtec.org/proceedings/,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC108136,