Tribe receives funds to test tidal turbine

The Passamaquoddy Tribe's Environmental Department at Pleasant Point has received a $120,000 award from the Bureau of Indian Affairs to test an underwater tidal power turbine. The Underwater Electric Kite turbines will be installed this summer for one-week periods at two sites off Pleasant Point, north of Kendall's Head and off First Island. Last November, the tribe received three-year approval for testing at the two sites from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).

Stephen Crawford, the tribal government's environmental director, notes that Underwater Electric Kite turbines are being commercially used in Africa and Alaska for producing electricity, and the placement in Passamaquoddy Bay will be the first time the turbines have been used in waters off the east coast of the U.S. for that length of time.

The turbines will be suspended from a barge that will be moored, and, during the testing, data will be collected concerning the amount of power that can be produced. Possible impacts on marine mammals will also be observed.

Crawford expects that the tribe will file with FERC for full site approval in 2010. He expects that, because of limitations in capacity of the electric transmission lines in the area, the greatest amount of power that could be produced from the tidal turbines would be 5 megawatts. One megawatt of electricity is enough power for about 1,200 homes, he notes.

Crawford says the representatives from the U.S. Department of Interior, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Maine Department of Environmental Protection and Department of Marine Resources, along with other responsible agencies, are being invited to visit the test sites on August 12.

The tribe has cooperative agreements with the University of Maine at Orono, Maine Maritime Academy and two contractors for the tidal power project and has applied to them for additional grant funding for the project.