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$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')url=http://www.blockislandtimes.com/news/2006/0617/News/028.html]Area waters a hotbed of energy experimentation (link)[/url]
By Read Kingsbury
June 17, 2006

The south coast of New England, from Nantucket Sound to Block Island Sound, promises to become a testing ground for renewable energy efforts. In addition to two wind power proposals, a plan for a tidal power project in Vineyard Sound has just been revealed. Meanwhile, a previously announced test of making power from wave power off the Point Judith breakwater is inching forward.

While the technology of making power 350 feet above the ocean is well advanced - almost "mature," some would say - the much less proven technology of making power on or below the surface of the ocean will, in the long run, prove to be more efficient, its advocates say. Two of the three methods will get a thorough testing, if plans go through, in waters not far from Block Island.

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The idea of harnessing wave action is new; the idea of harnessing tidal flow is not. Water wheels turned by tides were once in use. More recently, efforts have been made to build "barrages" across bays and put turbines in openings. The largest such installation, and the only one in Europe, is in northern France. But other places, such as the Bay of Fundy, have long attracted energy visionaries.

The newer technology involves submerging big propellers, 20 to 50 feet in diameter, in water where tides flow strongly. The tides move the blades, which turn a turbine, which produces power. One such device would produce between 500 kilowatts and two megawatts of electricity, enough to power 750 houses, it's claimed.

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The most advanced wave energy technology is the Pelamis device developed by a Scottish firm and just now being put into operation off Portugal. It is named for a sea snake because it looks like one: four long tubes each as long as a railroad car and more than 15 feet in diameter, jointed together. In each joint is a hydraulic pump. As the big tubes ride up and down, back and forth, in the waves, "high pressure oil is pumped through motors which drive generators."

You probably have to see it to understand it, but after several years of testing the firm, Ocean Power Delivery has sent the first of three such assemblages to a Portugal project that eventually will use 28 of them. Together they are supposed to produce enough power to serve 15,000 households.

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Search for news about the Pelamis sea snake here:
http://news.google.com/news?q=Pelamis

[Cabrone]

Pelamis has been operating off the Orkney Isles (off the nothern coast of Scotland) for a few years now. If politicians get serious then tidal + wave power could be huge for any countries with sufficient coastline.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4805076.stm

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Interactive Pelamis model: http://www.oceanpd.com/Anims/pelamis_V4.html

[Dreamtwister]

This isn't exactly new. I saw this on a TV show called "Beyond 2000" back in 1997, and even they said it had been in development for over a decade at the time.

I rank this right up there with railguns: Technically possible, but unlikely to ever see widespread application.

[Bleep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'I') rank this right up there with railguns: Technically possible, but unlikely to ever see widespread application.

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$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')url=http://www.oceanpd.com/Company/jobVacancies.html]Job Vacancies (link)[/url]
Currently we are recruiting the following positions in our rapidly expanding organisation:
Please email a CV and covering letter to vacancies -at- oceanpd.com
...snip...

[Dreamtwister]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Bleep', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'I') rank this right up there with railguns: Technically possible, but unlikely to ever see widespread application.

[Bleep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'F')or the same reason that so many other technologies will never be implemented: The energy density is really low.

[Bleep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'I')t's not because the technology is bad, in fact, 30MW/km^2 sounds pretty darn good to me. But a single gas power plant puts out around 400MW. Suddenly, you're talking about 13km^2, not 1 and 520 machines not 40 and £1.04 billion not £6m, just to replace a *single* gas plant that costs around £350m.

[Dreamtwister]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Bleep', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'F')or the same reason that so many other technologies will never be implemented: The energy density is really low.

[Dreamtwister]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Bleep', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'I')t's not because the technology is bad, in fact, 30MW/km^2 sounds pretty darn good to me. But a single gas power plant puts out around 400MW. Suddenly, you're talking about 13km^2, not 1 and 520 machines not 40 and £1.04 billion not £6m, just to replace a *single* gas plant that costs around £350m.

[Bleep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'S')o no, I did not include the cost of gas to operate the NG plant, just the construction costs. But neither did I include the maintainance costs of the wave farm. How much maintainance is Pelamis going to need?

[lorenzo]

Several renewables are now cheaper than natural gas. Wind is, biomass is, in some places, solar is. Wave power is too, probably.
So when it comes to generating energy for stationary use, there is no energy crisis whatsoever and there will never be one.

The problem is getting liquid fuels for transport. And here the electric + battery route is not going to be competitive for a long time. So far, only liquid biofuels are.

But anyways, wave and tidal power are being tried out a bit everywhere in Europe, with good results so far. So nothing new really.

[Dreamtwister]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Bleep', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dreamtwister', 'S')o no, I did not include the cost of gas to operate the NG plant, just the construction costs. But neither did I include the maintainance costs of the wave farm. How much maintainance is Pelamis going to need?

[Andy]

Dreamtwister,

Not that I am being condescending or anything and I certainly appreciate the limitations of wave, wind etc. but right now at current natural gas costs wind costing twice as much in capital is cheaper than natural gas power. Natural gas will not get cheaper in the future which is another consideration. At the same stage of development, wind power was much more expensive than the current expected prices for wave power devices in good regimes and thus it is likely that wave power ultimately will prove even cheaper than wind thanks to higher energy density.

With regard to the navigational hazard, even if a supertanker crashed into a series of devices, the beauty of modular renewables is that it would not take out the entire wave field assuming a large enough farm with tens or hundreds of devices.

The economics of natural gas power has forever changed and will present an opening for the renewables. At US $7 per MMBTU or higher, natural gas cannot compete with wind in the U.S. I do not see natural gas below $6 in the future.