Study on Feasibility of Renewable Energy to Fund Cost of Link

A new study, commissioned by Comhairle nan Eilean Siar (Western Isles Council), investigates the feasibility of creating a fixed transport link across the five-mile wide Sound of Harris and the potential for generating renewable energy from the resources of the Sound to help offset capital expenditure. The preliminary economic review by a subsidiary of Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. and Metoc recommends a combined causeway and bridge arrangement to replace the existing ferry link. The project costs could ultimately be offset by revenue from energy generation by off-shore wind turbines and tidal energy devices, integrated within the proposed structures. The project team conducted a review of the renewable resource and navigation issues, as well as socio-economic factors and civil and structural engineering constraints to develop a series of conceptual development options for evaluation. The report identifies the shallowness of the Sound of Harris as an obstacle to the use exclusively of tidal and wave technologies for effective power generation. A two-mile long causeway from Berneray to the tiny island of Killegray is proposed, with a row of offshore wind turbines that would be erected adjacent to the structure. A further causeway, or alternatively a hybrid bridge, incorporating tidal generators would stretch across the relatively narrow Skaari channel from Killegray to Ensay with a bridge crossing from Ensay to the Harris mainland near Leverburgh, with navigation through the Sound maintained beneath this bridge.