Turning the Tide

Marine Current Turbines (MCT) is the world leader and first mover in marine current and tidal stream energy. The company has two primary goals: technology development and commercial project development/installation. MCT's world lead in the development of this new technology, has at last opened the door to the until-now unreachable power of the oceans. 

MCT installed the world’s first offshore tidal turbine near Lynmouth off the coast of Devon in May 2003 and completed installation and commissioning of the world’s first commercial scale tidal turbine, the 1.2 MW SeaGen, in Strangford Narrows in Northern Ireland in 2008.  This is the forerunner for a commercial product soon to be widely deployed in the vital quest for clean energy from the oceans.

SeaGen is the only existing example  in the world of tidal turbine technology of a scale and performance capable of unlocking the potential of tidal stream and marine current energy on a commercial scale. SeaGen is four times more powerful than the second most powerful system of this kind, which was MCT's Seaflow system, which preceded it.  This latest product is uniquely and demonstrably capable of meeting the technological challenge of operating in an offshore underwater environment whilst reliably and predictably generating low carbon energy. Many features of the design have been extensively patented internationally. 

In recognition of their leadership position, MCT has received the backing of a number of major international utilities as well as institutional investors, including Siemens, Carbon Trust,  EDF Energy and Triodos Bank, and most recently ESBI, part of the Irish electricity utility. The company has also formed strategic partnerships with npower renewables amongst others to develop a series of sites across the UK and internationally.