Two wave and tidal developers have come together in a €2.3 million (£2m) collaboration to reduce costs and improve how infrastructure is operated and maintained.

CorPower Ocean (CPO) and Sustainable Marine Energy (SME) will work together on a 35-month Universal Mooring, Anchor & Connectivity Kit Demonstration (UMACK) project to address the affordability, durability and reliability of marine power systems.

They will develop and demonstrate an anchor-foundation-mooring-connectivity system which they hope will be able to halve the capital and installation costs of wave and tidal turbines.

The project is being funded by Scottish Enterprise and the Swedish Energy Agency.

The system will simplify vessel requirements, reduce the time needed for connection and ease retrieval of the devices.

The companies involved claim it will ultimately decrease the levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) and increase the return on investment.

Patrik Möller, CEO of CorPower Ocean, said: “The UMACK solution will improve reliability, reduce marine energy’s LCOE and accelerate progression towards large scale commercialisation.

“Performing extensive pre-qualification of the wet subsystems prior to full device deployment is a novel approach to marine energy development aiming to significantly de-risk the overall project and bring best practice to the industry.”