It is acknowledged that significant steps need to be taken to secure operations supply chains, develop durable devices, and gain consent and regulatory permits. The approach of the regulatory body and the other authorities quite often comes under the scanner in the development process for various sectors including tidal energy.
Tidal Energy Special - Interview with Marine and Fisheries Agency's Gary James.
Assessing the role of the regulatory body and the other state-run stakeholders in shaping up the tidal energy sector as this stage, Gary James, Licensing and Consents Manager, Marine and Fisheries Agency told tidaltoday.com that the regulatory bodies are often criticised for holding up the development process, but it is important to remember the reason behind the legislation which is more often than not is a shared interest and in the MFA's case, it is to protect the marine environment.
"We want projects to succeed and positively engage with developers to help and guide them through the consenting process. The MFA are currently processing wave and tidal demonstration applications within six months with some smaller projects consented within two months. The time taken does depend on the complexity of the issues raised during the application process," said James, who is scheduled to speak during the 2nd Annual Tidal Energy Summit 2008, to be held in London on 11-12 November this year.
In an interview with tidaltoday.com, James spoke about the deployment of clean reliable tidal stream power, Britain's quest for building a clean power supply in order to reach the EU-imposed target of producing 15 percent and much more.
tidaltoday.com: An underwater turbine that generates electricity from tidal streams was plugged into the UK's national grid recently. How do you assess the current deployment of clean reliable tidal stream power from Marine and Fisheries Agency's perspective?
Gary James: Like all Food and Environment Protection Act (FEPA) applications, we will assess a tidal generation project to predict its impact on the marine environment. To facilitate this, the developer will be, in most cases, required to produce an Environmental Statement that will examine potential impacts on fisheries, benthic communities, bathymetric, coastal defences, historic environment and any protected areas or species.
We consult with various organisations including the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (CEFAS), Natural England, the Countryside Council for Wales and English Heritage. Where we consider that a full environmental impact assessment is required, it will be subject to a full public consultation.
Once all the information submitted to support an application is assessed, we work with the developer and our advisers to seek practical solutions to any issues raised where appropriate before a decision is reached on whether to licence or not is made. We do adopt a common sense approach and all our decisions have to be evidence based.
tidaltoday.com: Considering Britain's quest for building a clean power supply in order to reach the EU-imposed target of producing 15 percent of the country's energy from renewable sources by 2020, what are your concerns and accordingly what do you recommend from Marine and Fisheries Agency's perspective?
Gary James: The MFA has always been fully supportive of the renewable energy industry and fully supports the Government's efforts to meet its targets in a sustainable way. One of our main concerns, which can only become a bigger issue, is the increasing competition for marine space. The Marine Bill aims to facilitate the best use of that available space. It will do this by a variety of means with the first step being a project to map the sea bed. This will enable potential marine projects to access good quality information on current marine activities and protected areas locations so making their site location much easier. This should help to reduce conflicts of interest as sometimes occurs presently. The regulators will find such a map useful in reaching a decision on applications.
tidaltoday.com: There are numerous embryonic device developers, with a handful of lead companies that have reached a critical stage in progressing their technology to market. How do you assess the current status of tidal energy at this juncture?
Gary James: I think tidal energy in the UK is at that interesting stage of moving forward from the engineers design office to the demonstration stage. It's is vital to prove the technology is capable of progressing into a commercial phase .
tidaltoday.com: From Marine and Fisheries Agency's perspective, what proactive procedures as well as monitoring programmes are in place to produce periodic assessments to identify the nature and influences that human activities have on the socio-economic uses of the marine environment?
Gary James: FEPA licenses and Coast Proteciton Act consents include conditions that are considered necessary to monitor the predicted affects reported in an Environmental Statement. Licence/consent conditions are always based on specialist advice from our advisers.
FEPA licences also contain monitoring requirements – put in place to test predictions made in developers Environmental Statements. All of this monitoring data is peer reviewed by our advisers when individual reports are submitted (during construction and for three years post construction).
With Defra, we have also recently commissioned a strategic review of all the monitoring reports we have received from offshore wind farms to date. This work will identify lessons learnt and confirm whether we can use the information collected so far to inform FEPA licence conditions. These studies should prove beneficial to other renewable industries as there will be common areas of concern. When we are in a position of having more wave and tidal devices installed in the water, we will be able to assess the information they gather in a similar way to benefit future developments.
There are also a number of other initiatives to ensure effective and coordinate marine data collection more generally such as the UK Monitoring and Assessment Strategy and the Marine Data and Information Partnership.
tidaltoday.com: The primary objectives of the legislation are to protect both the marine ecosystem and human health, and to minimise nuisance and interference to other legitimate uses of the sea. What according to you are major considerations when it comes to issuing a licence to interested companies in this sector?
Gary James: FEPA legislation is aimed at protecting the marine environment. There are several areas of concern that we do expect each application to cover. These include: benthic communities, coastal processes; fisheries (resource and industry impacts); wildlife (marine mammals and birds) and the historic environment. This is not an exhaustive list so it is always worth requesting scoping for an application.
Navigational safety is a key concern - the UK waters do tend to have some of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. One of our other key concerns is moving parts within some devices. Wildlife can come into contact with moving parts so it is important that mitigation measures are imposed to ensure wildlife is protected.
tidaltoday.com: A number of initiatives have been introduced to support the development of the marine renewables sector in Scotland. The ensured Scotland has the widest and most varied range of marine technologies being tested anywhere in the world. What can be learned from Scotland's Marine Space Planning scheme when it comes to cutting time in selecting optimum sites and the consenting licence process?
Gary James: Marine spatial planning is just one of many areas covered by the Marine Bill. Defra colleagues working on the Bill are looking at a variety of examples of best practice, including the Scottish scheme.
The Strategic Environmental Assessment currently being undertaken will also play a valuable role in identifying suitable areas for development around our coast.
2nd Annual Tidal Energy Summit 2008
Marine and Fisheries Agency's Gary James is scheduled to speak during the 2nd Annual Tidal Energy Summit 2008, to be held in London on 11-12 November this year.
For more information, click here:http://www.tidaltoday.com/tidal08/programme1.shtml
Or contact
Abbie Badcock by email abbie@tidaltoday.com/ +44-207-375-7581
