Rolls-Royce Testing the Waters with Tidal Power Turbines
The venerable Rolls-Royce, maker of some of the finest motorcars, engines and turbines in the world, will be sea-testing tidal power turbines off the coast of the UK beginning this summer.
According to company officials, Rolls-Royce along with a company called Tidal Generation Limited, will begin trials of a half-megawatt (MW) turbine this summer. Rolls has also entered a separate R&D partnership to build and test a 1 MW version that should be in the water in about 18 months.
“By 2020 there could be 300 MW (tidal power deployed) around the UK, or 100-200 devices,” Ric Parker, the director of research and technology for Rolls-Royce told Reuters. Parker said the company is spending about 5 percent of its R&D budget on clean energy technologies including tidal power and fuel cells.
Whereas the UK has been a bit of a laggard in terms of developing their wind energy resource (mostly because of aesthetic opposition), they have been at the forefront of tidal power development. Just last year a company called SeaGen installed the world’s first commercial-scale tidal power turbine off the coast of Northern Ireland and several companies including Google are exploring the possibilities of tidal-powered data centers—both off-grid and grid-tied—in the strong tidal currents surrounding the British Isles.
Image: Rolls-Royce
While the auto industry is having challenges with selling their primary product, here’s an example of one such company using their technical prowess to enter the renewable energy market.
It’s time we divert much of our talent and energy from products that create the problem to products that solve the problem.
The nice Rolls-Royce car shown in this article has nothing, other than name, to do with the Rolls-Royce plc company that is engaged in this tidal power programme. The Rolls-Royce car is today made by BMW. The Rolls-Royce Compnay makes power systems (power for land, sea and air), as you can see at our web site http://www.rolls-royce.com
R-R Motor Cars and R-R Plc. are different companies! The car one is owned by BMW and the one that makes jet engines etc is the one that is related to this tidal story.
Interesting project, but showing a Rolls Royce car made by the subsidiary of BMW, is a bit incongruous, given the fact Rolls Royce of marine and aerospace fame, no longer produces automobiles