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Scotland Building Wave Power Farms
eldavojohn writes "Scottish engineers are taking advantage of the huge ocean coast that Scotland enjoys by building a 'wave farm' to harvest electricity from the ocean's powerful waves. These big red tubes have been named the Pelamis System after a sea snake. Max Carcas, the business developer for the firm, says it is 'a bit like a ship at anchor or a flag on a flagpole, it self orientates into the waves ... Waves then travel down the length of the machine and in doing so each of the sections, each of these train carriages, moves up and down and side to side.' These snake-like movements push hydraulic fluid through generators to produce electricity."
I'm sure this questions is answered somewhere in TFA but I'm going to confess to being too damn lazy to read it.
Are the ocean waves consistent enough that fixed-length tubes will be efficient in all conditions, or are they adjustable for higher and lower frequency waves?
Where I find this technology to be very cool, it seems to me that simple tidal generators would be simpler and more consistent.
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
Power, Scotty! I need more power!
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