Slashdot Mirror
Gulf of Mexico Gets Wave-Powered Desalination Plant
blair1q writes "The US Army Corps of Engineers has issued the first permit for a wave-powered desalination plant in American territory to a company called Independent Natural Resources. Waves will operate 'Seadog' pumps, which will lift water into the plant and onto a water wheel connected to a generator, which will create electricity to operate a reverse-osmosis desalination system. The permit runs for four years. Let's hope they don't harm the environment, permanently impact drilling operations, or give Rube Goldberg any crazy ideas..."
http://inri.us/index.php/SEADOG Looks promising actually.
The increased salinity in the area of the device, perhaps.
The fact that it may ingest fish and other wildlife could be another issue.
Lots of possibilities.
The water would be for drinking, the salt and other minerals, probably sold.
The salt would most likely be discarded. Reverse-Osmosis doesn't produce nice crystals of salt that you can store away and sell. It produces SALTIER water, and salt-less water.
AccountKiller
Reverse Osmosis generates water that is super-saline (not dry salt). Under RCRA, highly concentrated salt-water (like the type that can be produced by mass amounts of reverse-osmosis) is legally classified as a kind of hazardous waste, and for good reason.
Reyling on the moon? Hah! Good luck! Damn thing keeps disappearing all the time, god knows where, and even most of the time it is there parts of it have broken off or something!
Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
It isn't really "used all over the world", certainly not commonly. France built a big one (Rance) in 1966, which was for years the only big one. There are now a few nearing completion in South Korea. Even when they finish, you'll still be able to count the number of tidal installations producing over 50 MW on one hand.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10