Carnegie Wave in new fund raising for CETO 6 development

ASX-listed clean energy developer, Carnegie Wave Energy has announced plans for a $6 million capital raising to go towards the development of its 1MW CETO 6 technology, the company’s attempt at commercial-scale units, for which testing began on Monday.

The capital will be raised via a share purchase plan, which will allow eligible Carnegie shareholders to buy between $1,500 and $15,000 worth of shares in the Western Australia-based company at 5 cents a share – roughly a 14 per cent discount on the current share price (as at close, Monday 24 March).

Carnegie said in an ASX release on Tuesday that the funds would be used exclusively to fund the activities associated with the CETO 6 project and for general working capital purposes, and to match the recently signed $20m Clean Energy Finance Corporation 5 year loan facility and any potential future government grants. They could also be used for any potential international CETO 6 project.

Carnegie is currently building the Perth wave energy project off the Garden Island naval base – the world’s first multi-machine wave energy project, which will use three of its CETO-5 machines (pictured above) and the first demonstration of the technology’s ability to provide emissions-free desalinated water.

But the company’s the next project will feature two CETO-6 machines, which will be twice the size of CETO-5 – around 500kW each – and will be the first of what the company expects to be its commercial-scale machines.

Last November, Carnegie completed a capital raising of $4 million, part of which was directed towards fast-tracking the design of the CETO 6 project.

“We are moving into an extremely exciting period of CETO unit assembly, testing and installation of the CETO 5 Perth Wave Energy Project plus the development of the commercial CETO 6 unit,” said Carnegie’s managing director, Dr Michael Ottaviano.

“Beyond its planned demonstration in 2016, the 1MW CETO unit will allow Carnegie and its licensee partners to roll out profitable wave power projects globally.”

The share offer opens on 26 March 2014 and will close on 17 April 2014.