Tidal energy converters: companies, research and technology

Orbital Marine Power and HydroWing are among the named commercial developers, while Caudal Energy is developing fin-inspired tidal power. Orbital received European Commission approval for its EURO-TIDES array in October 2026, and HydroWing was awarded an additional 10 MW for Ynni’r Lleuad at Morlais in February 2026. These are project and deployment signals, not a complete supplier list.

University of Edinburgh, Hohai University and Jiangsu University of Science and Technology are prominent research groups in the profile. University of Edinburgh has 46 documents in the 24-month window, while Hohai University has 38. Their work includes turbine wakes, hydrodynamics, foundation scour and the response of vertical-axis turbines to platform motion.

The recorded grant total is $68,176,929 across 44 grants since 2020. Separately, the funding-round data lists $8,545,168 for Orbital Marine Power in December 2025, with PXN Ventures and Scottish Enterprise as investors. Grant funding and company investment are different measures and should not be treated as a single funding total.

Caudal Energy raised €4.9 million in May 2026, while Orbital Marine Power secured $8,545,168 in December 2025. The Caudal Energy reports describe funding for its fin-inspired tidal power technology, and the Orbital round lists PXN Ventures and Scottish Enterprise as investors. These are the latest clearly relevant funding reports in the supplied information.

Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd, Fisher & Paykel Healthcare Ltd., and Contemporary Amperex Future Energy Research Institute (Shanghai) Limited each have 2 listed patents. Mitsubishi Electric, Guangdong Power Grid Company, Toyota Motor Corporation, Embraer SA and Ocean Renewable Power each have 1 listed patent. These holder counts describe the listed records, not the full scope of each organization’s portfolio.

Patent activity declined 50% in the last 12 months versus the previous 12 months; 24 patents were recorded in the 24-month window. This contrasts with publication activity, which was 252 publications last year and declined 1.2% year over year. The figures indicate a quieter patent period, rather than a uniform slowdown across all technical work.

Recent developments include a fully passive coupled-pitching hydrofoil study by Ocean University of China in September 2026 and European Commission approval for Orbital Marine Power’s EURO-TIDES array in October 2026. Other recent research addresses variable-speed control for dual-unit vertical-axis turbines, blade optimization under variable flows, and erosion of composite blades by suspended sediment.

Axial-flow turbines, cross-flow turbines, oscillating hydrofoils, tidal kites and ducted turbines are the main approaches listed. Axial and cross-flow designs use rotating blades but differ in rotor orientation; hydrofoils use oscillating motion, kites move through the current on a tether, and ducts guide flow around a rotor. Their trade-offs include control complexity, structural loads and flow interactions.

The United Kingdom leads the listed activity with 1,832 documents, followed by the United States with 1,513 and China with 1,103. France and Japan are also among the leading countries, with 538 and 423 documents respectively. These figures show a strong concentration of research and related activity in several countries, rather than a measure of installed capacity.

The listed applications include utility-scale electricity (152 documents), green hydrogen (55), island and coastal microgrids (54), remote and off-grid power (36), and desalination and water supply (13). Utility-scale projects connect converters to larger power systems, while the other use cases focus on coastal or isolated demand and pairing tidal generation with hydrogen production or water services.