They are going to have a tough time getting significant initial market penetration, though I imagine that if Australia is serious about reducing emissions and focusing on water security we would be misguided not to invest in wave power as a water supplier.
The more I look into this, the more attractive it becomes. After looking into the desal plant being built in Sydney (for comparison), the eventual success of CETO (Design could use some tinkering, I expect it to go to CETO IV before commercialisation, after an encouraging CETO III trial project) looks probable. The Sydney plant (costing upwards of $750M) will be built with a 250ML per day input, with the potential for expansion to 500ML. If estimates of 1ML per day prove representative for the CETO III model, then a farm of 250 units could match the size of the Sydney plant, without the enormous power consumption (will post figures if I find them). Opex for the Sydney plant is over $1M per week, a figure I expect is significantly lower for a CETO farm (negligible power costs, lower employee costs, lower maintenance costs).
The situation looks good for CETO unless I have missed something important (or if management have grossly overestimated daily flow rates).
I'm in. It looks like a very slow play, but will be worth the wait as more data is compiled and the need for water security more fully understood. It would be an act of governmental negligence not to promote this promising technology further.
CNM Price at posting:
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