Aguçadora Wave Park is the world’s first industrialised wave farm, and it is situated in Portugal close to Póvoa de Varzim. The farm has been operating since the 23 of September 2008. The plant does currently have 3 Pelamis P-750 machines which can produce a capacity of 2.25 MW. However, the wave farm is expected to be expanded in its second phase from 2.25 MW to 21 MW of wave power. This will be derived from using additional 25 Pelamis machines.

Wave Power in the United Kingdom

The 20th February 2007, the Scottish Executive announced its will to provide funding to marine power in Scotland. They are going to produce a wind farm which is expected to become one of the world’s largest wave farms, with a total capacity of 3 MW. This energy will be generated from 4 Pelamis machines.

There is another wave farm named as Wave Hub, which has been set to be established in the north coast of Cornwall, England. The project was accepted for funding in June 2007. There are already four operators interested in setting up wave power devices up to a capacity of 20 MW.

Wave Power In U.S

There are currently no large wave farms in the coasts of America. However, the President of Trade Association Ocean Renewable Energy Coalition says that there is a total wave power potential of “252 million megawatt hour a year” off the coast of the United States. There hasn’t been a steady step taken to develop wave farms but there are indeed lots of research and investment being provided by the federal for the field.

The largest national utility company, Pacific Gas & Electric Company did the 18th of December 2007 pronounce its will to buy power produced from waves. This was singed under some of California’s renewable energy restrictions. In the state of California, utility companies are required to produce 20 percent of their total electricity supply from renewable energy sources as per this year (2010). The law is likely to be enforced during the years to come to maybe 40 percent by 2020 and henceforth.

A total of $200 million in federal funds was provided under the Marine Renewable Energy Research & Development Act of 2007. The fund is meant to scrutinize the potential of wave energy technology for the period 2008 to 2012.

America’s Department of Energy (DOE) is also responsible for providing a $50 million of fiscal funds for research, development, creation and commercial application of so called ocean energy. For the year 2008, there were 14 institutes that received fiscal allocation. The appealing institutions were:

1. Oregon State University
2. University of Hawaii.

Some ocean energy projects initiate in America can be found at the coastline of California, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island and New York. Grays Harbor Ocean Energy Company of Seattle is the company which has applied for the development of these wave- at the Federal Energy Regulatory commission.

You might want to read: World’s Largest Wave Power Station Being Built In Sweden

Source: Wikipedia.org

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There are already natural self-propelling mechanisms that do provide energy in such ways. It is a small, barrel shaped organism, which is apparently alike streamlined jellyfish, known as Salp. This particular organism receives all its required energy from ocean water. The most fascinating about this Salp is that scientists suggest that its waste material helps in eliminating carbon dioxide (CO2) found on the upper ocean and in the atmosphere.

It was Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) together with MIT that reported the half an inch to 5-inch-long creature (salp) energy capacity to be beyond previous expectations. It was published and revealed in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, that the ocean-dwelling salps use to capture and eat diminutive organisms and even larger ones – eventually this renders these tiny creatures extremely complex.

Laurence P. Madin, WHOI Director of Research as well as an investigator says that he has since long believed salps to be very powerful filter feeders present in the ocean. The current study revealed that these creatures could consume very small sized to large size sea-animals. In other words, they can practically consume a mouse to even a horse.

Phytoplankton (food particles) is captured by salps via an internal mucous filter net. Earlier it was believed that the creature could only capture particles equally to or larger than 1.5 micron-wide holes present in its mesh.

The recent study proposes that salps can capture food particles, which are even smaller according to Kelly R. Sutherland, PhD at the MIT/WHOI joint program for graduate student. In the current laboratory at WHOI, Sutherland, food particles in varied sizes were offered: smaller, equal to and larger than their mesh opening. It was found that more than expected of the smaller particles were consumed.

This information revealed to be very important as it describes why salps, are able to survive, singly or in chains of hundreds or even more, in the open sea. Madin, who was Sutherland’s advisor at WHOI said that larger food particles are relatively low in the open sea, and their ability to filter small particles help them to survive.

The interesting part is how salps help in recycling carbon dioxide. According to Madin, the very fact that they eat small and large particles and thereafter turn them into larger packed dense fecal pellets. These carbon-containing pellets are heavier and will thus much sooner sink to the sea bottom. Sutherland says that “This removes carbon from the surface waters,” and stocks it in the deep where it will not be seen for centuries.

Additionally, as carbon is stored in the ocean bottom, there will be larger space available on the upper ocean to support carbon; this will thus reduce the amount of carbon dioxide leveling up to the atmosphere. This was explained by Roman Stocker, who was a co-author and work at the MIT’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

Stocker said that the aggregation of particles, assembling small particles and slowly growing them, is the most important function of salps. The benefit of removing carbon dioxide on the upper sea level is that less CO2 gas will harm the atmosphere at large.

Recently, it was believed that small particles or cells were only consumed by protozoans, appendicularians and some specialised metazoan grazers. The ability of the salps to eat small bacteria and phytoplankton make them part of a team of organisms helping to clean the environment from greenhouse gases.

The carbon exchanging-role is impressive by these creatures. They act with their magical ability as a natural undersea engine. Moreover, Stocker says that salps are better vacuum cleaner than predicted. – The study was funded by WHOI Ocean Life institute and National Science Foundation –

Sources: Science Daily

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If ever you would come across a surfer to discuss the energy of ocean’s waves you would be surprised. The ocean is unlike rivers where massive energy is produced from hydropower dams. The ocean provides with tidal current what can provide an infinite amount of energy. There are always waves; only the magnitudes of waves alter.

Ocean Power – Harness or Waste It

The concept of using ocean energy was explained by John Lienhard, a mechanical engineering professor from University of Houston. He said that repetitive cycle of the moon creates a gravitational pull that propel tons of water to move towards land. However, the endless tons of water do eventually flow back. The energy is spent uselessly as it dissipates back to the huge oceans.

There are actually three basic ways to generate energy from the sea. These are through tidal power, wave power and ocean water temperature variations; known as “ocean thermal energy conversion.

According to Energy Quest, an educational website of the California Energy Commission, the sea can be harnessed for energy in three basic ways: using wave power, using tidal power, and using ocean water temperature that varies in a process called “ocean thermal energy conversion”.

1. Ocean Tidal Power
Tidal energy uses the high and low tides to harness energy more directly. For instance, conventional hydropower stations in dams operate using the same methodology. There are already large oceanic tidal power farms in France and Canada that are providing energy to the population.

2. Ocean Wave Power
Wave power is harnessed through the movement of waves. The ups and downs of waves can for example be used to create air pressure that is driven up in pipe to spin a generator. Nowadays, some small-scale ocean-wave power systems are used to provide electricity to warning buoys and lighthouses.

3. Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC)
This particular system tries to produce energy through the differences in temperature of water in the deep and on the surface. The variation in heat is expected to be used to produce energy. There is a test station that has been erected in Hawaii with the objective to one day make this technology more effective. It is expected that one-day OTEC technology will be able to produce a significant amount of energy.

The Perspective of Ocean Power

Many experts propose that ocean energy is better than wind energy. It is suggested that less turbines will be required to produce energy with water, as the water’s natural density is much more intense than wind energy. The cost of harnessing ocean energy is now radically expensive. Knowing that ocean technology is mainly in an infant and experimental phase of development its cost is likely to fall once it becomes popular. In the near future, analysts are forecasting that ocean power will account for at least 2 percent of the energy needs in U.S.

Many companies are specialized in the field of ocean power technology. In Sweden, we have” Seabased AB” and at Long Island City, New York, a company named “Verdant Power”, is expanding tidal energy supply in New York’s East River.

Ocean energy is an emerging field that is lagging behind the renewable agenda of many countries. However, it might likely surface as pioneer to save land by substituting wind farms to tidal energy.

Source: Environment/About.com

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The Sweden Energy Agency is supporting this mega project with a grant. It was only today, that the full financial support to construct wave power plants at the coast of Smögen in Sotenäs, Sweden was made public.

The total sum that Swedish Energy Agency is providing is SEK 139, 000, 000 of a total of SEK 250, 000, 000. This project is going to be the hugest of its sort in the world.

The Seabased industry technology will be made fully commercialized, both demonstrating and showing the capacity of the technology. The plant will be constituted of around 400 to 500 units linked together. The capacity will be of around 10 MW.

The Swedish Government supports the growth of renewable energy, thereby encouraging Swedish Energy Agency to finance new technologies and making them commercially suitable. There has been another four projects that have been offered grants and this is the fifth and last one for the actual program according to a report submitted May, 2009.

There have been endless research and analysis performed by all the three institutions (Fortum/Seabased and Swedish Energy Agency) before the project was fully approved.

Yet, there is still another permission that needs to be achieved. The Swedish Environmental Authority and the European Unions will have to give their accreditations for construction to take-off.

This is a particular technology that Seabased AB is commercializing. They confirm that wave energy is a lucrative alternative sources for energy. The potential are endless knowing that the earth surface is mostly covered by oceans

Source: Press Release

Companies: Seabased AB and Fortum

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The project is already pinpointing on connecting turbines from north coast of Scotland to wave power generated from Belgian and Danish waves, Solar energy from the abundance of solar panels as well as hydro-electric dams in Norway’s fjords. Nine countries are grouping together forming this huge step in the North Sea for Clean Energy.

Sweden, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark, Germany, France, United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Ireland are planning to work together to make this a feasible project. Work is expected to launch within the decade. It will attribute to conquest the European 2020 goal of providing 20% of its energy from alternative sources of energy.

The network will cost around, 30 billion Euros and will have cables of thousands of kilometers placed undersea. This will make renewable energy finally a sustainable source of energy. The most fundamental setback of renewable energy has always been the unpredictability of weather. However, having energy generated from various regions in the European region through different sources will assure that energy will constantly be supplied. This will make it a sustainable and reliable energy source.

The super-grid will assure that energy is constant. Wind will always blow, if it isn’t in France, it will be in the United Kingdom. Moreover, similar to the sun and waves renewable energy will balance their supply through different climates in various regions.

Furthermore, going to Norway could add up an astronomical battery of 30GW. There are many hydroelectric power stations in Norway, which could store the clean energy in case of low demand. It could act as a battery in the super-grid network.

It is rare fact that many countries are already exploiting renewable energy at large scale, such as in the United Kingdom. Yet, Lord Hunt, Energy and Climate Change Minister in UK, considers that collective actions are vital in leveraging progress to further levels as they produce windfall gains.

Currently in Europe, offshore wind projects that are work-in-progress will produce 100GW, which accounts for 10 percent of the Europeans total demand. It is as much energy produced as 100 large coal-fired plant produces. The rise in wind energy will require additional focus on the European grid. Certainly, this topic is going to be addressed when the countries sum together.

Compared to contemporary sources of energy, renewable energy is widely decentralized. For instance, solar energy can be integrated into buildings, and this is another challenge that the North Sea super-grid must accommodate.

The hydro plants in Norway have a capacity of 30 large-scale coal-fired power stations. The surplus of power produced can be used to pump-up water in to the uphill creating a reservoir that can generate electricity whenever the demand increases again.

The benefit of offshore grids such as the super-grid allows trading of energy across borders. This will definitely make EU more competitive in energy management.

Even the European Commission has been evaluating potential grids in the North Sea. The plans are to be available in this year (2010). EU said that with the absence of the nine-country grid plan the project wouldn’t become a feasible reality.

The exact cost of the project is still uncertain. Based on studies carried out by Greenpeace in 2008, the cost of comparable projects for project in the 2025 was around 15 to 20 billion Euros. The whole project will give rise to more than 6000 Km of cables through-out the region. Moreover, EWEA conducted a study in 2009, and concluded that to integrate the 100 GW wind farm projects in progress the bill would increase to around 30 billion Euros.

Discussion is going to be undertaken this month. Legal, environmental, technical and planning aspects of the super-grid project will then be addressed. According to Hunt, the main objective is to establish a common vision.

The countries that are participating in this visionary action will be part of a team shaping the future. The super-grid project has both political and institutional support. The institute for energy (IE), is positively encouraging this collaborative step towards renewable energy. Moreover, Gordon Brown as well as Nicolas Sarkozy say that connecting with southern Europe’s renewable energy as well as other regions in the continent is optimizing the use of alternative sources of energy.

However, according to IE, if only 0.3 percent of the sun rays heating the desert of the Middle East and Sahara would be captured it would be enough to meet the whole Europeans’ demand for energy.

High voltage direct current cables will be used to transmit the energy in the super-grid. Eventually these cables are much more expensive than conventional cables in use. However, they are more effective as they maintain a higher concentration of energy transmission over long distances.

According to Hunt, the super-grid is a challenge today and previously a dream. Moreover, the 2020 target of supplying 20% energy from renewable sources is just the tip of the iceberg as the aim for 2050 is a total decarbonised electricity production system.

The North Sea super-grid can in the future extend to a much larger project such as the “Desertec Industry Initiative” (DII). It is a project of providing 15 percent of Europe’s electricity demand from the Mediterranean and deserts. This proposal for the project was published in November 2009, and has already many large companies backing it up.

The DII project is a $400 billion worth project focusing on concentrated solar powers (CSP). The technology has been around in the United State and in Spain for decades. The “uniqueness of this project is not the technology but the scale”. It is, if launched the biggest project ever proposed.

Source: Guardian

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Gaining Licensing rights to this area allows Carnegie what they require to facilitate the construction and operation of a full sized single CETO wave power system in order to confirm it has the capability to deliver power at a high performance and will evaluate it for a period of three years.

The company is thrilled with the steps forward thus far, which escalates the proposal and demystifies the project and concept. It will also set the pace for the finalization of the technological growth, which is a required part of the process in order to accomplish commercialized exploitation of the system.

The CETO system is operationally invisible and is anchored to the ocean floor. Underwater buoys force the pump devices, which in turn forcefully pushes the water through a pipeline. It transports it to the shore where it is used to power hydroelectric turbines while producing no emissions. This means it can generate wave power into non polluting electrical current.

The granting of this license means the activity to get this part of the project up and running will be the initial phase of what Carnegies has planned for a five megawatt [5MW] demonstration of it commercial program with support from the state government’s LEED  [Low Emissions Energy Department] financial offset program of AUS. $12.5 million.

Renewable Energy Holdings manufactures, generates and commercializes clean energy systems across wind, water and methane capture or collection, solar and hydro electric power production projects on the continents of North America, Australasia and Europe.

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Aquamarine Power triggered their connection of the Oyster wave power unit just offshore of Orkney, Scotland, and it is now a benchmark for ocean power procedures that currently generate electricity.

The Oyster is basically a hydraulic pump that works using a hinged flap, and a big iron component that shifts to and fro based on the wave action. As this component goes back and forth, it triggers a hydraulic piston, which then draws water below ground into a hydro electric turbine that powers a generator producing electricity.

The maximum amount of power capacity produced from the Oyster 1 device is approximately 2 MW, this figure is based on where it is located. Aquamarine Power had their research financed for this project courtesy of the UK government and is currently researching and working on the next version of the Oyster unit.

Presently, there are numerous technologies which are being researched that will utilize the energy from waves or tidal surges, which can produce electrical power, these include below water generating systems. The benefit of using a pump engineered device comes with the simplicity of its plan and the many components like the gearboxes and generators, which do not come in contact with the water.

Right now there are 20 Oysters that are connected to the ocean bottom. In about 35 feet of water, and these are able to generate enough electricity to power up to 9000 UK residences, this number comes from the manufacturer Aquamarine Power.

There is a similar device known as the sea dog pump out of the United States, which uses a similar method of pumping water from offshore to hydro electric turbines located nearby that will generate the electricity.

Initial testing for the Oyster was completed at the European Marine Energy Center. In the United States there is currently a call out to set up a similar ocean power research facility in the south part of Massachusetts.

The vast coastal regions of the United States and what with the UK being an island, it only makes good sense to further investigate and research the incredible potential of the energy that could be generated by the offshore ocean waters. Both the United Kingdom and the United States are committed to reaching alternative energy solutions for their respective populations. As both countries continue to depend on carbon producing fossil fuels to generate their electric needs, new renewable sources of energy will become more important.

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Statkraft is a government operated power facility located in Norway and it has recently launched a sample model power plant that generates power by utilizing seawater, there will likely be more coming. The power production plant counts on an idea known as osmotic pressure gradient and will make two to four Kilowatts at a cost of roughly eight million dollars. Industrialized models will eventually come on line in 2015 that generate power in the Megawatt vicinity.

At first glance the idea seems a bit strange, it is actually beginning to foster interest elsewhere with researchers and those in the desalination industry given that creating power using this method is actually an expansion on the reverse osmosis process used in desalination. Oakland California company, Energy Recovery is a desalination expert and actually supplied some of the apparatus required by Statkraft to construct the prototype. Trials of the unit are supposed to start later this year.

It has been reported that IBMs Almaden Labs, as a case in point, are setting up a plan to check if the IBM desalination membrane technology is useful as a part of the osmotic pressure gradient process. A new Danish venture in called Aquaporin in the meantime is evaluating whether it can launch a synthetic protein it has developed for desalination energy capture. Aquaporin is working alongside French water conglomerate Veolia on desalination exploration.

It is believed that a total of two thousand terawatts hours annually could potentially be produced using this seawater technique, wherever there is a running water source emptying into the sea there is possible energy, according to the microbiologist who is CEO of Aquaporin. Statkraft says the actual number is more like sixteen hundred, which makes up about fifty percent of the European power usage every year. However, the sixteen hundred to two thousand terawatt hour possibilities are global potential – not just in Europe itself.

Osmotic pressure gradients do a good job of generating water pressure while not needing a forceful current. Fresh water from streams and riverine sources push toward a seawater laden tank. At the midway point between sea and fresh water there is a membrane. The dissimilarity between salt concentration forces out the fresh water through the membrane, the membrane also acts as a useful means to eliminate contaminants in the water.

The more fresh water getting to the tank, the less salt water concentration becomes but the increasing quantity of water raises the pressure within the tank. The pressure is captured by a turbine generator. It is very much like the technique used in Niagara hydroelectric production only there is no Niagara. With
An interesting selling feature of this technique of producing power is the relative consistency with which power is produced, certainly more predictable than renewable wind or solar power. These osmotic pressure gradient power generation units will not be required to withstand the inclement conditions that tidal power systems must endure.

However, this process is still highly conceptual and forecasts are few and far between whether or not it can be commercialized at a decent price. Another question remains if it will even pass muster with the environmentalists. One thing is clear, Statkraft has been keen on the notion for many years now and new renewable energy sources are always welcome.

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Getting energy from the ocean is an exciting possibility for a renewable energy source and one that has not been tapped at any effective mass scale and this has plagued its promise. Up to this point, any authority of this wave power potential has belonged to brilliant backyard innovators. Some of these too farfetched to be of any commercial value.

With the affiliation between the huge defense contractor and the pioneering wave power company, a new dawn may have risen on these kinds of partnerships. Lockheed earned $42.7 billion last year, Ocean Power Technologies – well, suffice to say at least they made it this far.

Lockheed has a wealth of experience and knowledge working for – and on – military contracts. They also come with the mechanical and manufacturing, quality control and assessment capabilities required to make this work. Ocean Power Technologies has that brilliant pioneer and all that comes with them, tech patents, integrated hydrodynamics, energy conversion and computer systems controls and scale designing wave power capability with SCADA. The U.S. Navy comes with the strong desire to begin using renewable energy.

The idea is sound. Ocean Power Technologies designs a PowerBuoy® – this is a one hundred fifty kilowatt floating structure [point absorber], with a generator for a PTO or power take-off system. The structure has multi faceted abilities – it is scalable, but it can also produce energy in any number of wave conditions and heights. It could be used in numerous ocean current scenarios.

When the energy has been produced, it needs to get to shore somehow. Ocean Power Technologies has come through again with what they call an Underwater Substation Pod. This scalable design unit is currently awaiting a patent and can cost effectively accumulate the energy produced by upwards of ten PowerBuoy units and transport it to the coast in just one conduction cable.

The enormous defense contractor and the “backyard brainiac” will work together into the future on functional scale energy producing ventures for the U.S. Government. Two terawatts of wave power is a huge gift to a world hungry for alternate energy sources. The Jobs provided by such a technical undertaking would also quell some of that hunger.

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