OREANDA-NEWS. JSC Lenhydroproject, wholly-owned by RusHydro (ticker symbol: MOEX, LSE: HYDR; OTCQX: RSHYY), and Atlantis Operations (UK) Ltd have signed a Memorandum of Understanding aimed at cooperation in regards to joint tidal power plants projects in Australia.

Vladimir Pekhtin, Deputy Chairman of RusHydro's Management Board and General Director of Lenhydroproject, commented: “Our cooperation with Atlantis is an important step in promotion of innovative technologies, such as orthogonal turbine, developed by RusHydro, to the international markets. World's interest in tidal energy is increasing every year, as well as the need for advanced technical solutions allowing tidal power to compete in the power market. We have been enhancing and working through a unique orthogonal turbine technology for several years and we are confident that it is ripe for commercial use.”

Tim Cornelius, Chief Executive Officer of Atlantis, said: “This Memorandum of Understanding, signed after our recently announced cooperation with Dongfang of China, is a further test of Atlantis' leading position on the emerging market of tidal power. In addition to the portfolio of projects, we have launched earlier, we are intended to play active role on the new opening markets with high tidal power potential: China and Western Australia.”

According to the Memorandum the parties will identify prospective tidal power projects in Western Australia to implement using tidal range orthogonal turbines, a unique innovative solution of RusHydro, and conduct feasibility study for these projects. Tidal power capacity along the coastline of Western Australia exceeds 6.1 kW/m2, which is substantially higher than in many other tidal power projects implemented worldwide.

The parties have already started water and power calculations, allowing to identify the capacity and annual output of one of the prospective projects. During 2014 an application for funding for the project will be submitted by Atlantis to Clean Energy Finance Corporation in Australia (CEFC).

JSC Lenhydroproject is a Design and Research Institute, a leader in designing hydropower and water facilities, providing a full range of design and supervision services for the construction of hydraulic structures in the areas with specific geological and climatic conditions. More than 90 hydropower plants in Russia and CIS with total installed capacity of 24,500 MW were built, restored and reconstructed with Lenhydroproject's assistance, including the largest plants: Sayano-Shushenskaya, Chirkeyskaya, Zeyskaya, Krasnoyarskaya and Kolymskaya HPPs.

Atlantis Resources Limited is a vertically integrated turbine supplier and project developer in the tidal power industry. The Group holds interests in a diverse portfolio of tidal stream development projects, which includes 100 per cent ownership of MeyGen Limited, the company developing the MeyGen project in Scotland. The directors believe that MeyGen is the largest consented tidal stream power project in Europe, and is scheduled to commence power production in 2015.

Alongside its project development interests, the Group owns a portfolio of patents and patent applications relating to tidal power generation and sells tidal generation equipment and engineering services to third party developers as well as its own projects. The Group, which is revenue generating, also conducts industrial research and development and provides specialist consulting services globally.