Dr. Lienhard felt confident that the speed of the joint venture’s foundation and the advancement of the Memorandum of Understanding for these first machines reflect the joint venture’s attitude needed for the successful implementation of this new technology: “Relationship building, up to partnerships, becomes visible here. And the basis for these partnerships is not only built from common innovative thinking and acting, but also from a common will to sustain relationships beyond short-term visions and activities. We are convinced that, within the next few years, ocean energies, and the tidal current power technology is only one form of it, will contribute a significant share to renewable energy production, similar to the one of wind energy today.”

“Partnership, innovation and sustainability” being the motto, the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology as well as the Korean-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry host the eleventh Asia-Pacific Conference of German Business within the next few days. Leading representatives of German companies will discuss main trends of business matters regarding the Asian region and the relevance of German-Korean business relationships.

It was such a relationship resulting into the recently founded joint venture Voith Siemens Hydro Tidal Corporation. Its first project offshore South-Korean province Jeollanam-do will be a tidal current power plant which finally will have an overall  rated capacity of 600 MW. This covers the energy demand of approx. 400.000 households in that region.

In contrast to other tidal power concepts, no dam is needed for tidal current power plants. They rather use the kinetic energy of the current and convert it into electricity. Ideal locations for tidal current power plants are sounds, bays or areas between islands, where the tidal current needs to “squeeze through” and, therefore, is accelerated.

Renetec is a Korean company that drives project development in the renewables energy sector since 2001.

Voith Siemens Hydro Power Generation is a Group Division of Voith and - with a workforce of around 2,500 employees and an order intake of around 720 million Euro in business year 2005/2006. Voith Siemens Hydro Power Generation belongs to the world-wide leading companies for hydro power equipment.

Voith is setting standards in the markets paper, energy, mobility and service. Founded on 1 January 1867, and nowadays with approximately 34,000 employees, a turnover of 3.7 billion Euro and 250 locations worldwide, Voith is one of Europe’s large family-owned companies.

Voith is an official partner of the initiative “Germany - Land of Ideas.”