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Green Energy Now, And On The Tide
thpr writes "The Electric Power Research Institute and its partners have completed their Offshore Wave Power Feasibility Demonstration Project, which defined potential wave energy projects off the shores of the United States. This is building off of work already done in Scotland (and elsewhere). San Francisco, New York and other areas are considering trial installations of the technology. It is interesting to note (table 1 in the report) that the energy density (kW/m^2) that can be achieved is much higher than wind or solar. In addition, harnessing 24% of available wave energy near the US at 50% efficiency is equal to all of the hydropower currently generated in the US (~7% of total electricity production). On a separate note, in the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy's $1.2B 2006 budget the Department of Energy is closing out the Hydropower Technologies Program. Maybe that's why this technology is missing from our National Energy Policy?" Until it reaches maturity, though, U.S. readers can pay for other forms of green energy.
nothing for you to "sea" here?
Don't forget nuclear power!
I had but a simple dream, to destroy all humans.
24 percent is a lot .. that's basically thousands of miles of coast. For what? 7% of energy? And what about maintenance costs? Effects on marine life .. Imagine dolphins or whales getting caught in this .. ships .. can ships operate safely?
As great - or as needed - as green energy may be, we'll never see widespread adoption of it. At least, not so long as the oil industry exists.
Most likely this will have massive effects on oceanlife and beachlife in the areas they are installed. I view it as a technology with its uses but the greenies have yet again started blabbing about how ecofriendly it is without thinking about the true long term consequences.
In other words, these projects affect the currents, at least locally which in turn *will* affect the biological systems that depend on these currents, to what extent? I don't think we know.
We need alternate energy, but we need to honestly compare the impact of each energy extraction method we consider. Personally, I think nuclear is the lowest impact energy tech.
I've made up my mind and now I've got to lie in it.
Both power providers and consumers need to work in harmony: (1) the power companies are to increase the efficiency in generating more power and (2) the consumers are to utilize the available energy in an efficient manner.
/.ing. You can do a little to cut some energy expenses by following these actions. In reality I am not going to save over $20 a year. But when people start doing the same, it soon becomes a real money.
There isn't much I can do for (1). But I can do for (2) by replacing light bulbs with energy saving bulbs (ESBs, or compact fluorescent bulb that fits in an incadescent lamp), turn off the light where not needed, and turn the damned TV when
We know it's the future. We know with adequate research spending it can be achieved and will make any talk of green or nuclear power pointless. It can be both done before going to Mars, for comparable price, and will help greatly with achieving that goal. It will eradicate global warming by letting us produce cheap hydrogen. So what are we waiting for?
It'll be a barrier to coastal erosion which badly effects some parts of the world.
Wave power is a total ridiculosity - you want to sacrifice TWENTY FOUR PERCENT of US coastline in order to supply SEVEN PERCENT of the electricity.
:)
This is our electricity usage BEFORE we tack on the electricity used to power our hydrogen cars, which will raise our consumption an order of magnitude.
Using algal biodiesel, breeder fission(with development on fusion), and wind where suitable, are the only remotely practical eco-friendly choices that are sustainable - Photovoltaic trumps them all, but to convert even just our current electrical needs to photovoltaic would cost more than we've spent on imported oil since we started importing oil. We could create an infrastructure to supply the entire nation's demand for fuel with algal biodiesel on an amount of money that's similar to what we spend anually on importing oil, which is coincidentally about the same amount of money it would cost to install a single hydrogen pump at every gas station in the US.
Wave power is and has always been a crock as an energy scheme.
whoops, forgot to log in
People in Soviet Russia, however, appear to be afflicted with amusing juxtapositions of the aforementioned situation
Yes, tidal forces DO cause the earth's rotation to slow down.
The tidal forces created by the earth on the moon have slowed the rotation of the moon down to the point that we only see one side of the moon. That is, the moon rotates about once a month. Similarly, the tidal forces of the moon are slowing the earth's rotation down, and it will eventually reach one about one rotation per month also. Assuming that the sun doesn't become a red giant first. And, speaking of the sun, there is also a tidal force that from the sun that will eventually cause the earth to rotate once per year. I'm not sure who this conflict between the moon's and the sun's tidal forces work out.
Conservation of angular momentum means that the tidal forces are causing the moon to orbit the earth faster, and thus further away.
While all these tidal forces are very small and only add up over very long periods of time, they can be measured. In particular, things like variations of the amount of snow on mountains, the amount of water in man-made lakes, the force of huricanes, and variations in the shape of the earth caused by earthquakes all add up to enough to cause the need for leap seconds.
Leap years keep the seasons from rotating through the calendar. Leap seconds keep the zenith of the sun ("noon") from rotating through the day. I forget the exact value, but there is something like an accumulated 20-30 seconds difference caused by these forces over the last 50 years, and therefore there have been 20-30 leap seconds added since then.
SPF support for most open source mail servers can be found at libspf2.
How viable is solar power? I was asking myself this question and here's the numbers I came up with.
In 2001 the USA used 96275 trillion BTUs of energy that year. This comes to 3.22 trillion watts.
Now there are about 295 million people in the US, so this comes to about 11Kw per person at any given time.
This means each person uses is responsible for 262 Kwh of power per day.
Now lets say that square meter of sunlight provides 1 kw of energy on average and the average area gets 5 good hours of sunlight per day. Looking at this chart, you can see that this assumption isn't too far off.
The typical solar panel is about 30% efficient. This means that for every square meter of solar panel would render 1.5 KwH every day.
This means that each man woman and child would need 174 square meters of panel to be responsible for all the energy made and used in their name!
If every person in the united states of America put up solar panels. We would have over 51 billion square meters of panel, that's close to 20,000 square miles of panel or the equivalent of covering most of over in panels.
Now these numbers account for all energy used both domestic, industrial, and exported. Also these numbers do not account for the added or lost efficiency of converting systems over to pure electrical power as opposed to other energy processes like those used in the internal combustion engine.
I left the links to my math in just incase I botched anything.
That even when a totally non-CO2 emitting, non-radioactive power source is found we still get the "OMG!! It's could cause xxx", uproar.
Living here in the post-industrial wonderland of NJ, I find this amusing in a bad way.
The other thing that shocked me was the supposedly "higher" costs for "green" energy. Bad news folks, it's lower than what I pay to Conectiv/Pepco.
And now back to our regular insomnia...
Not 24% of coastline, but 24% of total tidal energy. You can't assume that the waves are equal everywhere along the coastlines.
And 7% of total energy demand is nothing to scoff at. Imagine if it was actually realised - a lot of greenhouse gases would be saved. All I hope is that the picture is still rosey after an in-depth environmental assessment.
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Daily energy news and discussion: http://www.thewatt.com/
Daily energy news and discussion: theWatt.com
For those who want more, the best links on for intelligent green reading:
WorldChanging.com -- which also has an article about wave power.
TreeHugger, which is already linked in the story.
Dave Pollard, which writes very insightfully about lots of things including environmental philosophy.
Green Car Congress, where you can get the best news about green mobility, cool cars & industrial developments.
IDFuel, which is more about design but covers some of the same ground as TreeHugger.com
FuelCellWorks for all the latest news about fuel cells.
Grist Magazine, for news and a touch of humor, plus lots of interviews.
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Did you stop to think that the ocean life in those areas needs those waves and currents to survice and that this system might damage them?
Hmm, first of all.. These generators won't keep people from surfing because they'll be pretty far out at sea.
Secondly, they are not going to "stop waves" or affect much the area where they are.
Thirdly, they'll have a much smaller impact on local and global life than coal plants and other ancient technologies. Global warming will affect billions - basically all life on earth, I think that a few barrel-looking things at sea is a good price to pay to help generate clean energy.
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Waves are cool, but don't forget ... OTEC (Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion)
My father was a primary designer on this, so I had the "real scoop" on what was going on there in real time, it was real exciting stuff back then!
Mini-OTEC, 1979
In 1979, the first successful at-sea, closed-cycle OTEC operation in the world was conducted aboard the Mini-OTEC, a converted Navy barge operating in waters off Keahole Point.
This plant operated for three months, from August-October 1979, and generated approximately 50 kilowatts of gross power with net power ranging from 10-17 kilowatts.
Its turbine generator produced a gross output of up to 55 kW. About 40 kW were required to pump up 2,700 gallons/min of 42F water from 2200-ft depth through a 24-in diameter polyethylene pipe and an additional 2,700 gallons/min of 79F surface water, leaving a maximum net power output of 15 kW.
This was a joint effort by the State of Hawaii and a private industrial partner.
More linkage: NREL's OTEC site
Google
Summary of said article: the industry is going to be building 20-years-behind-the-times reactors which will merely replace the existing reactors. And a lot of other hot air/meaningless commentary.
This guy needs to check his facts. No one is trying to say that pebble bed reactors are going to solve the energy crisis. The industry is developing (and has developed) more efficient, smaller, safer 3rd generation PWRs (pressurized water reactors) that use the same concept as traditional reactors but with vastly improved design (source: Nuclear News, November 2004). As a nuclear engineer, I can tell you that these will be the new reactors.
There is, of course, also the point that old reactors are aging. Yes, they are. Maintenance and reevaluations of those facilities are constantly under way, and they will likely be safe to operate for many more years. In the meantime, more modern reactors will be built at an increasing rate that will not only compensate for reactors that must be shut down in the future but also provide more energy.
I had but a simple dream, to destroy all humans.
Not this again?
You don't seem to realize just how big the planet is compared to these things.. The cargo ships and oil tankers are thousands and thousands and thousands on our seas.. Do they have a big impact?
Did tall buildings in cities stop all the wind? Forest?*sigh*
These things would actually replace coal plants and other crappy sources.. That would have a NET POSITIVE EFFECT on the planet.
Why are people so quick to complain about any minuscule disadvantage of a green source, but they never talk about coal and oil and such? Because it's new? I thought slashdot users liked new things..
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Aight, I've seen tons of misinformation and bogus speculation here, and I just perused the document!!
(1) The facility is out to sea. Hawaii is the closest at 2.5KM, while California is at 13 to 20 Km.
(2) They are in about 40M of water. Waves break in about 1-4M of water, depending on size.
(3) The things FLOAT on TOP of the water! (The "Pelamis" design does anyway.) They are mored with cable, and are no where near breakers.
(4) They are not so much "wave" energy as "swell" energy (ie waves = coastal, swell = deep ocean).
Huge variation in wave height makes near-shore uneconomical when waves are small (often), and SEVERELY dangerous when large. (Name a man made structure that has withstood BREAKING waves or a sustained period of time.)
Even when waves are small on the coast, deep sea swells still oscillate across the surface unhindered. The point is to harness these oscillations for energy (as far as I can tell).
The environmental impact will be truly negligable, except for moorings and swell energy depleted before it reaches the coastline.
The very environmentally-paranoid surfer in me says... Go for it!
-Pie
First, there are no CO2 emissions. That's the most important thing. Fossil fuels leave behind CO2 which heats up the planet.
Second, there is no soot and other such trash going to the atmosphere. Third, the amount of radioactive waste is in fact very little compared to the amount of waste produced by other methods.
Yes, the waste is highly toxic. And the acquiring of the uranium leaves waste behind. But even so, nuclear power is cleaner and better than any plant fossil based fuel source (oil, gas).
Even if you are green (I am), get your facts correct and don't think with your emotions in things like these.
Actually we just like to argue and call the other guy a numbskull. At least I think I read that in the FAQs someplace;)
Put me down for "all of the above", plus zero point vacuum energy and all the other schemes. I even think that has potential, along with atmospheric and ground based "natural" electricity. That's a biggee I never hear talked up and it should be. We are sitting on a huge spinning ball of molten iron that has a huge electromagnetic potential just hanging around mostly untapped, unlooked at, undiscussed. why I do not know. Maybe re-look at that, a la some tesla action.
I'm a "more power" kinda guy. We got new coal techniques that leave the coal underground and use this special bacteria to convert it to methane, easy to extract and pipe away and use in the existing natgas pipelines then. We got your nuclear batteries and somewhat better designed reactors. We got solar and wind (I got me some of that stuff). We got wood and cellulose to ethanol. We got algae that give off hydrogen gas. We got just using more insulation (still the best bang for the buck but not sexy enough to talk about usually). We got your geothermal. We got your biodiesel and making fuel from hemp a couple of ways. heck, for some cargo, they could bring back sailing ships with new dynaimc sailing designs for the long haul. Man, there's tons of solutions out there.
And so on and so forth and yada yada, I can probably rattle off another couple dozen if I think on it some and check a scosh and refresh me memories with google.
The energy solution is to use "all of the above" wherever it fits in the best. There is no one size fits all magic bullet solution. If tidal gennys work, I say throw em out there! We got umpteen millions of naked roofs with shingles rotting away on them, I say throw some solar PV up there, it'll add in. Stick a few megawatt wind gennys on every farms in the midwest, help the farmers out some and they help us out then, they got the land, we need the juice. Throw them tidal gennys off the coasts. Stick the hydropower back in and stop tearing down the old dams. Put the methane digesters in. Whatever. We been tallking about it too long.
The deal is, we can't wait for big money and bigger politics government to do all of it, we have it in our little grubby hands to all be part of producing energy, not just be total consumers and waste all our loot on stoopid toys and just kvetch about it all the time. I say it is every geeks civic duty to be the leader in their neighborhood and at least do something along these lines to get the ball rolling, just like we were the early adopters of computers and got that ball rolling.
You got "all the way" with making some energy personally, "part of the way" and "none of the way" to go with it. That's IT, three choices only that every geek gets to make on that question. "None of the way" is the only guaranteed "you fail it" selection, so everyone has a 2/3rds chance of making a correct decision..
Wait a second.
Article summary: "Nuclear is a bad idea because a lot of nuclear plants are getting old and will need to be replaced. Also, if everyone had solar and wind and personal gas turbines, we wouldn't need nuclear. Oh yeah, and politicians are evil and trying to exploit this for their own benefit."
(1) Those nuclear plants are getting old anyway, and will need to be replaced anyway. That has nothing to do with what they're going to be replaced with.
(2) Not everyone does have those, and I rather doubt everyone's going to suddenly buy those. Great idea for new houses, lousy idea for existing ones.
(3) And there aren't any politicians trying to make a fast buck off green power either? That's practically what a politician's job *is*.
Where's the section that looks at a realistic breakdown of realistic costs and goals? Where's the section that makes any attempt to compare the two besides "hey! look! NUCLEAR POWER ISN'T PERFECT!"
-1, flamebait.
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People will start doing it when energy prices start going up. No one will do it for $20/year, unless either 1) they are so poor that $20/year means something for them, or 2) they are aware of the hidden environmental costs and care about such things.
IMHO, the best way would be to put all the costs in the final price. Make people pay for the true cost of energy and you'll see people worry about conservation.
There is one alternative that is fully sustainable and has been working economically for decades. Brazil has been producing ethanol powered cars for 25 years. Every gas station in Brazil sells straight ethanol at a lower price than gasoline. Although the proportion is lower now, in the 1980's about 90% of the cars in Brazil were powered by straight ethanol, and the rest used a 75%/25% mix of gasoline and ethanol. Today several models of cars in Brazil come with "flex power" motors, which can burn any proportion of ethanol/gasoline mix.
The Brazilian alcohol program is the largest renewable energy program for cars in the world. The only reason why it has been pulled back a little is because the oil prices aren't as high now as in 1980, after you take inflation into account. Also, the whole country has a much better economical situation, with a lower debt, internal oil production is higher and world sugar prices are higher (Brazilian ethanol is made from sugar cane). All these factors have contributed to decrease the proportion of ethanol in the total fuel consumption in Brazil, but ethanol is the first and most viable alternative for renewable transportation fuel in the world.
Many years ago I was a proponent of nuclear energy. What convinced me to change my position? Simply put, I saw how nuclear power plant officials, government regulators, and industry consultants lied, over and over. When the Ginna nuclear power plant near Rochester NY had a serious accident, I listened to lie after lie from the official plant spokesmen. The story started out as "there is nothing wrong, this is a regularly scheduled test" and modified itself by the hour as the last hour's lie was exposed. I certainly have no reason to believe their final story, as I think it is more likely they just settled on a lie no one could expose.
My sister-in-law lives near the Hannaford nuclear facility and the lies continue to this day. The pattern: Reassuring lie, get caught, slight mea culpa, new lie. At least twice since I've been paying attention some official spokesman has declared that the mistakes of the past are gone and they will deal honestly and forthrightly from now on, and then been caught out in another cover-up within a year or two.
So could nuclear energy help us? Yes. Can we trust the people who control it today? Absolutely not.