Nova Scotia tidal power projects

Plans to develop tidal power resources in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia are moving forward, as Fundy Tidal Inc. announces firmer plans to deploy tide-powered generators at three locations in Digby County.

The extreme tidal range in the upper Bay of Fundy gives Nova Scotia a tremendous tidal energy resource.  The province has been home to the 20 megawatt barrage-based Annapolis Royal Tidal Power Plant for almost 30 years; more recently, Nova Scotia established a Marine Renewable Energy Strategy setting a target of 300 MW of commercial tidal development by 2020, an amount roughly equal to 10% of the province's electricity consumption.  Nova Scotia also established a Community-Based Feed-in-Tariff or COMFIT program designed to give qualified tidal energy developers certainty over project revenues early in the development phase.

Fundy Tidal Inc. proposed three projects in Digby County that have received approval through the feed-in tariff program.  The largest, to be developed in the Digby Gut, could generate up to 1.95 megawatts of power.  Two smaller projects in Grand Passage and Petit Passage could each generate up to 500 kilowatts of power.  These three projects have an expected development cost of $30 million.  Fundy Tidal also received approval for COMFIT funding for two projects on Cape Breton Island.

Last month, Fundy Tidal announced a strategic partnership with Tribute Resources Inc. and Tocardo International BV to develop the three Digby County sites.  Under the terms of that partnership, Tocardo will delivery tidal turbines, and will set up a tidal turbine assembly and manufacturing plant in Nova Scotia.  Fundy Tidal will serve as the overall developer and will retain a 51 percent interest in the projects, with Tribute Resources owning the remaining 49 percent interest.

This is not the first time tidal power projects have been proposed in Digby County; previous concepts have ranged from tidal barrage development to deployment of hydrokinetic turbines in conjunction with Ocean Renewable Power Co.  Fundy Tidal now plans to construct and deploy the Digby area projects to deliver power as soon as 2015.  Will these plans come to fruition?

July 22, 2011 - Nova Scotia tidal energy: past, proposed, and future

This week's story about a possible hydrokinetic tidal energy project in Nova Scotia's Bay of Fundy reminded me of large-scale tidal projects that have been proposed in northeastern North America over the years.  Chief among these may be the Passamaquoddy Power Project proposed in the early 20th century, but the PPP wasn't the only grand project dreamed up.

Sunset over the harbor at Five Islands, Georgetown, Maine.

One tidal project floated in the early 1980s involved developing up to 6,000 MW of tidal power capacity through two dams in Nova Scotia.  One dam would have blocked off Shepody Bay (the arm of the Bay of Fundy reaching toward Moncton and the Petitcodiac River near the Nova Scotia - New Brunswick border), while the other would have walled off part of Minas Basin between Cape Blomidon and Parrsboro.  Neither of these dams was ever built, although the tidal energy resource of Minas Basin continues to draw interest.

One reason may be the impact of the projects on coastal communities along the Bay of Fundy -- and in fact well out into the Gulf of Maine.  A news article from 1981 suggests that these tidal dams would have increased the tidal range in Portland, Maine -- about 300 miles away -- by up to 18 inches.  This increase in tidal range could have negatively impacted coastal communities, eroding soil, causing property damage, and tidal flooding.  By contrast, the article suggested that the Passamaquoddy project or a smaller one proposed for Half Moon Cove would not raise tides elsewhere.

These projects may not have been built, but with Nova Scotia's new community-based feed-in tariff, developers of in-stream tidal projects can expect $652 per MWh for qualified energy produced in the province.  Will Nova Scotia's feed-in tariff lead to more tidal projects in the Bay of Fundy?

July 19, 2011 - Nova Scotia tidal energy, feed-in tariffs and projects

Hydrokinetic energy projects are cropping up in Canada just as they are in the U.S.  (For a review of hydrokinetic energy, check out last month's entries.) The Bay of Fundy is famous for its tides, among the largest in the world.  The Canadian province of Nova Scotia is home to a large portion of this resource.  Nova Scotia is also home to an existing tidal power plant: utility Nova Scotia Power's Annapolis Tidal Power Plant.  This tidal energy project, which came online in 1984, has a capacity of 20 megawatts and can generally produce between 80 and 100 megawatt-hours per day.

The tide drops out of a tidal marsh near the Back River on Arrowsic Island, Maine.

Now, Maine-based Ocean Renewable Power Co. has announced plans with Nova Scotia-based Fundy Tidal Inc. to install underwater hydrokinetic turbines to generate electricity from the Bay of Fundy's tides.  The proposal involves the installation of 15 to 20 150-kW turbines in the Petit Passage between Digby Neck and Long Island off western Nova Scotia (map) by 2012. 

The new venture, named ORPC Nova Scotia Ltd., plans to benefit from Nova Scotia's feed-in tariff.  That program, known as the community-based feed-in tariff or COMFIT, is projected to require utilities to pay qualified tidal projects 65.2 cents per kilowatt-hour for their output.  This rate, about six times higher than the typical rate for electricity, is a significant incentive for the development of the province's resources.  Additional support is available from the provincial government to assess hydrokinetic and small tidal projects like the Petit Passage project.

This project may be smaller than the 500 MW Passamaquoddy Power Project first proposed in 1919, but it could represent the first commercial deployment of underwater hydrokinetic turbines in the Bay of Fundy, and follows in Nova Scotia's traditions of harvesting the energy of its tides.

June 15, 2011 - Nova Scotia feed-in tariff

Nova Scotia is poised to set favorable rates for community-scale renewable electricity projects.  This community-based feed-in tariff can help small projects get off the ground.

Back in April 2010, the Nova Scotia provincial government released its Renewable Electricity Plan (32-page PDF).  This document, subtitled “A path to good jobs, stable prices, and a cleaner environment”, sets forth a detailed plan “to move Nova Scotia away from carbon-based electricity towards greener, more local sources, and sets a commitment to reach 25% renewable electricity supply by 2015 – and a nonbinding goal of 40% by 2025.

While the plan envisions that most of the new renewable energy needed to meet these goals will come from “industrial-scale projects”, a key element of that plan targeted at smaller projects is the community-based feed-in tariff (COMFIT).  The COMFIT is designed to benefit 100 megawatts of qualified renewable projects connected to the grid at the distribution level.  To qualify for the COMFIT, a project must be developed or owned by municipalities, First Nations, co-ops, or non-profit groups, or be a small business operating through Community Economic Development Investment Funds.

Feed-in tariffs are widely used in the global renewable energy context.  As the Nova Scotia plan notes, “[m]ore than 45 jurisdictions around the world, including Spain, Germany, Ontario, and Vermont, have established feed-in tariffs (FITs) that support and encourage small-scale and community ownership.”

In Nova Scotia’s case, the feed-in tariff plan is designed to start small, with a limit of 100 MW of pilot projects.  The plan explains this cautious approach by noting that it is technically difficult to interconnect intermittent generation at the distribution level.  The plan also describes the balancing act between facilitating small-scale development while keeping ratepayer costs low:

Government has chosen not to extend the COMFIT to larger projects. Just as a commercial farm can produce vegetables cheaper than a garden patch, an industrial-scale wind farm can produce electricity cheaper than a backyard turbine. There are many economies of scale in renewable power production. Nevertheless, a conscious decision has been made to encourage small as well as larger renewable electricity projects. This is partly to ensure widely dispersed energy sources, and partly to encourage rural community economic development. A FIT will result in somewhat more expensive electricity than open competitive bidding, but it gives these smaller projects a degree of market certainty.

The plan continues:

Renewable electricity produced from small local projects will be slightly higher priced than electricity from large-scale projects. But since the total amount of power from COMFIT projects will start out small, the overall impact on rates is low—estimated at less than one percent on a typical consumer’s bill. Of course until the UARB sets the COMFIT rate, and we see how fully it is taken up, the precise impact can’t be calculated with certainty.

The Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board has held a public hearing on the COMFIT program rates, and is expected to issue an order finalizing tariffed rates early this summer.  Staff's consultant proposed the following tariff rates:

• $452 per MWh for wind projects ≤50 kW
• $139 per MWh for wind projects >50 kW
• $156 per MWh in year 2012 for biomass CHP projects, composed of a fixed component of $94 per MWh and an escalating component of $62 per MWh representing the cost of fuel
• $140 per MWh for run-of-river hydro projects
• $652 per MWh for in-stream tidal projects.