The Indian Ocean island Reunion has taken shipment of the first Ceto 4 wave power generator from WA company Carnegie Wave Energy. This will be the beginning of a 15MW wave energy generation facility. The first stage of the project is being funded by a grant from the French government.

From the company’s press release, 26 September:

Wave energy developer Carnegie Wave Energy Limited (ASX: CWE) is pleased to advise that its next generation commercial scale CETO unit (CETO 4) has been manufactured and delivered to its deployment location on Reunion Island by French marine defence contractor DCNS.

The unit will now undergo pre-deployment testing similar to the CETO 3 pre-deployment testing undertaken by Carnegie at its Fremantle test facility in Western Australia earlier this year. Once pre-deployment testing is completed, and subject to completion of some final installation aids, offshore installation is currently scheduled to take place during the Southern Hemisphere summer.

The CETO 4 unit will be deployed and tested offshore at the Reunion Island project site. Successful testing and operation of CETO 4 is planned to be followed by a grid-connected 2MW CETO project at the same site with subsequent further expansion to 15MW. Activities to date have been two-thirds funded by French Government grants and the grid connected project will receive a marine energy feed-in tariff.

Carnegie’s Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Dr Michael Ottaviano said,

“The CETO 4 project represents the first joint project activities of Carnegie, EDF EN and DCNS. As well as testing the CETO system in a different wave climate, we’ve taken the opportunity to test some new design ideas. We’re grateful to the support of the French Government and the local Reunion region.”

The activities associated with Reunion Island and CETO 4 follow on from the signing of a CETO technology licence and joint venture agreement with EDF EN in 2009 and a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with EDF EN and DCNS in 2010. The MoU outlined the intention of the parties to work together