March 2019: The tide keeps going in and out

Introducing Tide Plymouth and getting the policy right

In 2017 Paul Hamlyn Foundation awarded Iridescent Ideas CIC a small grant in 2017 to explore the concept of community-owned tidal power in Plymouth.
Our final report can now be found on the Tide Plymouth website (www.tideplymouth.co.uk). Tide Plymouth was created on the back of the work we did with a number of excellent partners, such as Plymouth Marine Laboratories.

What is Tide Plymouth?

Tide Plymouth was conceived by Gareth Hart and Paul Read over tea and cake, the discussions focused on business ideas that would showcase the potential of social enterprise to it fullest. It had the working title of 'Our Ocean' which was created to look at the potential of tidal energy in Plymouth.

As directors of Iridescent Ideas we spend a lot of time supporting other people who create amazing social enterprises, but we wanted to develop a sustainable business that could be replicated around the world. 
So based on an example in Scotland the idea of a community owned tidal turbine in Plymouth was developed.  We brought people with specialist knowledge together  to write a feasibility study (found here), which we called 'Our Ocean'.  This laid the foundation for the potential of future projects and in turn led to Tide Plymouth being created.

www.tideplymouth.co.uk

Policy paper

We created a paper that explores some policy issues that national government, local government and interested organizations could address to make these projects easier to develop in future.

We aim to share the policy paper far and wide to shed a light on an industry we feel needs more support to grow and have a significant impact on the way we generate energy for future generations. 

If you are interested in anything you have read here then please feel free to get in contact to find out more.

Contact us!