A wave energy converter and buoy will be deployed out at sea to the northwest of Gozo over the coming days for feasibility studies on wave energy in the Mediterranean.

A similar converter will later be placed in the northeast of Malta, off Dingli Cliffs, to enable data to be collected from two different points over the next 18 months. The plan is to eventually test an actual wave energy converter in Maltese waters and collect data.

Speaking to The Malta Independent on Sunday in an interview, Prof. Luciano Mulé Stagno, an Associate Professor at the University of Malta Sustainable Energy Institute, said that although the devices being used are only model wave converters and not full-size ones, they are still several metres long.

Wave data will be collected and the International Oceanic Institute (IOI) will model the waves before collecting power data to better assess what a full-scale device would produce. The northwest of the islands, off Dwejra and San Rafflu, is the best area for such tests.

Prof. Mulé Stagno pointed out that, ideally, wave farms should not be too far from shore. Limitations are very few, as the device only needs to be anchored in a similar way a ship is anchored out at sea.

“Our waves may not be as good as in the North Sea, Scotland or Denmark, but that does not mean they are not good enough and it may still be economically feasible to produce energy from waves,” he said.

Our territorial waters are huge, so it is possible for us to have a wave farm in a few years, whereas wind farms have to be anchored in depths of 60 to 80 metres, otherwise the technology starts becoming prohibitively expensive.

“If the results are positive, the message will be picked up by everyone, including other countries, so if and when the technology matures, foreign companies may be interested in asking us for expertise,” the professor added.

The Malta Council for Science and Technology has made €200,000 available for the project, which is being run jointly by the Sustainable Energy Institute, the IOI and the Malta Operations Centre (MOC) together with a Maltese-Danish joint venture, Dexawave.

Prof. Mulé Stagno is confident that the project will be feasible because of Malta’s location in the centre of the Mediterranean. The resource itself as well as the reliability of the device needs to be tested, but its beauty is that the sea and its waves are unlimited.

To date, there are no wave farms anywhere in the Mediterranean, unlike wind farms, so Malta is getting in on the ground floor. The potential to eventually establish an industry is there, and Malta will be in a position to give expertise and create jobs – exactly the purpose of the MCST fund.

Concrete results are expected by the end of next year.

Meanwhile, solar energy is being exploited more efficiently and photovoltaic panels are finally becoming popular, although the number of actual installations is still fairly low.

Prof. Mulé Stagno believes the government needs to adopt a “much more aggressive” policy. But since energy costs are rising, and the prices of such devices are falling, the use of PV panels and solar water heaters will have reached acceptable levels in the next decade or even before.

“A culture needs to be created,” he emphasised.

He is however confident that Malta’s10 per cent renewable energy target will be reached by 2020 as a result of the schemes in place, because of the country’s flat roofs and plenty of sun we could be targeting 50 per cent or 100 per cent with a bit more effort.

The total installed capacity is currently below 15MW.

“The beauty of solar, unlike wave energy, is that it’s a tried and tested technology,” the professor noted. “It is the most reliable form of green energy because solar panels have been around for some 40 or 50 years”.

Even parking lots and empty fields can be used for the installation of such devices and although we cannot have a 90MW farm such as in Italy, we can have places that take 1MW or 2MW in devices. If the land needs to be used for something else at a later stage, the panels can simply be removed.

Currently, the Sustainable Energy Institute is launching optional credit classes for undergraduate students in Arts, Law and other subjects with the intention of educating more people and creating more awareness on efficient energy uses. Courses are also being held for installers through the Malta Resources Authority, since the practice is still relatively new to Malta.

Meanwhile, 24 students, mostly engineers and architects, have finished their first year in the new Sustainable Energy Master’s degree course. The intake for a second Master’s degree course will open in October with the aim of creating a pipeline of talent for the industry.