The water desalination plant connected to the Perth Wave Energy Project – the world’s first grid-connected wave energy plant – has been switched on and is fully operational.
ASX-listed Carnegie Wave Energy announced the new milestone on Friday, seven months after the array of CETO 5 generators off Garden Island in Western Australia started sending wave-generated electricity into the local grid.
To coincide with the announcement, the company’s COO, Greg Allen, presented the plant’s first bottle of water to the state’s minister for water, Mia Davies, at the Australian Water Association’s Annual WA conference.
Carnegie’s reverse osmosis desalination pilot plant is fully integrated with the CETO wave energy power plant, meaning that it is capable of running both from grid power or directly from hydraulic power from Carnegie’s wave project, or a combination of both.
The containerised desal technology was manufactured and supplied by MAK Water Industrial Solutions (MAK Water), with Carnegie signing an agency agreement to act as the exclusive agent for MAK Water in South America earlier this year.
The agreement has now been extended to include remote islands to capitalise on the opportunity for high quality, containerised desalination and wave power solutions in these locations.
The first joint Carnegie/MAK Water island opportunity is currently underway at four sites on remote Indian Ocean Islands.