Salinity Power is the Ultimate Green

Green energy comes in many guises these days, from wind-power to wave-power. One of the more compelling of the new kids on the eco-energy block is salinity power, which uses the concurrence of salt-water and freshwater in estuaries and marries it with the natural, effortless process of osmosis. March 12, 2009 In 1748 the monk/physicist Jean-Antoine Nollet exploded a wine-filled pig’s bladder when he submerged it in a trough of water (What did he think would happen?). The resulting discovery was of course, osmosis, and two teams of clever Europeans think they can use this natural process to give the world clean, green and perpetual electricity by exploiting the chemical difference between salt-water and fresh water.


The two teams, Wetsus (The Centre for Sustainable Water Technology) in the Netherlands and Statkraft in Norway, are racing against the clock to be the first to make salinity power a viable alternative to traditional methods. And while they’ve based their energy solutions (pun intended) on similar science, their approaches to generating electricity are quite different.

GizMag