Nicola Sturgeon defends resurrection of tidal project fund

Nicola Sturgeon has defended her government’s resurrected tidal project fund against the concern that it is “window dressing”.

The Scottish government announced a fortnight ago that it has relaunched the Saltire prize as a fund.

The prize was originally launched by the first minister’s predecessor Alex Salmond in 2008 with an offer of £10 million for the first team to generate 100GWh of wave or tidal power within a period of two years.

However it was abandoned in 2017 after the prize was not claimed.

The Scottish government announced earlier this month that it had relaunched the £10 million Saltire Tidal Energy Challenge Fund to support the commercial deployment of tidal energy projects. Wave energy projects will not be eligible to participate, unlike the previous version of the scheme.

Responding to concerns expressed in the Scottish parliament by Liberal Democrat MSP Liam McArthur that the prize is “window dressing”, Sturgeon said: “We have recast the prize to make sure that it matches developments in tidal energy.

“The fact that the Saltire prize was not doing that was nothing to do with the situation when the prize was launched; it is simply the case that tidal energy has not developed in the way that people then thought that it would. We are determined to ensure that the recast initiative helps those who are seeking to develop tidal energy.”

And based on discussions with international renewable energy investors, the first minister expressed confidence that the remodelled prize better reflects the work they are doing.

The fund will be open to applications until 6 December, but successful projects must be ready to deploy in Scottish waters by the end of March 2020.