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It's the place of the soul that inspired poets and writers, but it is also a fragile ecosystem that needs to be protected in a relationship man-environment increasingly unbalanced. It is both a literary tòpos and a threatened resource. The Costa Smeralda Prize, now in its second edition, offers all the variations on the theme of the sea: an appointment that is renewed and proposes the collaboration between the Costa Smeralda Consortium - organiser of the event - and the MEDSEA Foundation, which coordinates the "Blue Innovation" section of the prize.

MEDSEA has announced a selection for the research of projects, patents, studies that have distinguished themselves in the field of technical or technological innovation or product or process management, applied to the Blue Economy and aimed at reducing the negative impacts of economic activities in the seas and oceans.

In the 2018 edition, the "Wave for Energy" srl, in collaboration with the Polytechnic of Turin, won the award for the "Blue Innovation" department. They developed a device for the production of energy from the waves of the sea, called ISWEC (Inertial Sea Wave Energy Converter). "The ISWEC technology responds in an intelligent and non-invasive way to the need of investing in one of the most interesting sources of renewable energy: the visual impact of the device is minimal, it looks like a small boat that can be placed at a certain distance from the coast," said the president of MEDSEA, Alessio Satta, who presented the “Blue Innovation” Prize.

This year the challenge has been relaunched because we never talk enough about the sea. "We are Europe's pier in the Mediterranean and the country with the greatest nautical tradition in the world", commented Simone Perotti, winner of the 2017 Fiction department with "Rais": an outpost on the sea to which the Costa Smeralda Prize refers, on the occasion of the evening that opens the cultural season in the heart of the Mediterranean. In addition to "Blue Innovation" and "Fiction", the award also boasts the "Non-fiction" section, won in the first edition by Sandro Carniel with "Oceans".

Many prestigious guests this year accepted the invitation to participate at the event, directed by artist and blogger Beatrice Luzzi: Piero Angela and Maxwell Kennedy, Bob Kennedy's ninth son, will arrive in Costa Smeralda; Roberto Cotroneo will be part of the jury while the director of Radio 3 Marino Sinibaldi will be responsible for introducing the award. The appointment with the Grand Gala of the Sea is for 27 April in Porto Cervo.