Spanish floating wind pioneer X1Wind has landed a multi-million-euro cash injection to commercialise its innovative PivotBuoy concept, one of a new generation of designs in the sector moving away from offshore oil industry-inspired engineering.

The €2.5m ($3m) grant, from the European Innovation Council, will support the step-up of the technology developer’s design, a modular tension leg platform with single point mooring system that allows the structure to ‘weathervane’ to harness the wind stream, from its current 1:3 scale version to a size fit for the ultra-large-class turbines now in the market.