Orkney Council to spend £150k to dispose of £1 wave device

The wave generation device was purchased by the council in 2017

A wave energy converter bought by Orkney Islands council for £1 is expected to cost £150k to decommission.

The council purchased the Pelamis wave device in 2017 for a nominal sum in the hope of saving it from destruction, given its heritage value to the island.

But it has failed to find a use for the 180m (591ft) long wave machine and is now looking to dispose of it.

The council received £45,000 at the time for any disposal costs, but has spent almost all of it on maintenance.

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Gareth Waterson, the council's director of enterprise, told BBC Radio Orkney: "Now is the time to get it decommissioned.

"We've spent nearly as much as the £45,000 that we got in maintaining it. It has been a bit of an albatross."

The council will tender for its removal to a location where it can be processed for scrap, with the value recouped by the council.

The Pelamis P2 wave energy device was nicknamed the 'sea snake'

The device was developed by the now defunct Pelamis Wave Power company, which went into administration in 2014. It was originally valued at £2m.

It has been mooring off Lyness Wharf, Hoy, since the council bought it.

Mr Waterson added: "It was a fairly iconic device, people will probably remember seeing it on the telly.

"It was referred to as the sea snake, the big yellow thing that looked like a fairground ride out at sea."

The council planned to preserve it as an artefact to mark ocean energy research and development in Orkney.

But it found that the 1,350 tonne device would be too difficult to maintain as a display item.