The company, which has yet to get Government backing for its schemes, hopes the facility will become the centre of a ‘Made in Britain’ tidal lagoon turbine industry.
It launched the tender alongside a report setting out the potential a full-blown tidal power industry offers the UK supply chain.
The report ‘Ours to Own’, sets out the scale of the industrial opportunity for tidal lagoons as the Government continues its review into the future of the renewable energy technology.
The £1bn Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon has been brought forward as a pathfinder project for UK and international tidal lagoons at full-scale.
This presents an immediate opportunity for UK’s engineering, construction, steel and manufacturing industries to win contracts totalling more than £800m, and over £6bn for the first project to employ the Swansea Bay template at full-scale at Cardiff.
Potential UK tidal lagoon prize
- Domestic market for Made in Britain tidal lagoon turbines and generators = £17bn
- Domestic market for Made in Britain tidal lagoon turbine housings = £24bn
- Exports to international tidal lagoon market = £30bn
Mark Shorrock, Tidal Lagoon Power’s chief executive, said: “180 years ago Brunel built the Great Western Railway and we still celebrate that British manufacturing and engineering success today. A roll out of tidal lagoons will be of equally significant scale and will also benefit our country for over a century”.
“It is a textbook case”, said Roger Evans MBE, Chair of the independent Tidal Lagoon Industry Advisory Group. “We have the natural resource, we need the power and we have the manufacturing skills to take on the challenge ourselves.
“A huge domestic market creates the ideal conditions for standardisation and mass manufacture, giving the UK a competitive edge on the world stage.”
The proposed 100m long turbine manufacturing and pre-assembly plant will be located between the Kings and Queens Dock at Swansea Bay.
The facility will receive major turbine components from manufacturers across Wales and wider Britain, with all machining and pre-assembly of the sixteen 7.2m runner diameter turbines required by the pathfinder tidal lagoon taking place on site.
The facility wouldinitially employ up to 100 skilled workers, with an additional 150 project workers accommodated in an onsite office welfare area. Further tender details are available at the Sell2Wales website.
