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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..."
Unfortunately, it wasn't designed to de-oil the water.
Can't they just burn the water to power it?
http://inri.us/index.php/SEADOG Looks promising actually.
What would you do with Desalinated water that would involve it going back into the ocean?
"Thanks to BP, for the first 3 years of operation, the desalination plant will actually produce Kraft Cajun-Style Salad Dressing."
Anybody want a peanut?
Using wave technology, which varies in cycles, you can store desalinated water at times of peak flow.
A tidal generator can have many forms - some, which look like buoys, are basically upside-down wind turbines that use the flow of water instead of air to move the blades, while others can use permeated cells. Desalination plants have been around since before WW II, naturally, as have tidal generators.
Delivery of energy supply is one of the main problems with desalination - the process uses a lot of energy, so using local sources such as tidal power makes more sense than trying to string extra power to the plant.
Not that you'd want to drink the swampy and/or briny water in many lowland tidal areas ...
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Thanks to the spill this plant is self lubricating.
Paying taxes to buy civilization is like paying a hooker to buy love.
"Rather than sell electricity or water, though, operators will be taking data to measure impact on sea life, the generator's performance, and the cost of operation, said Douglas Sandberg, the vice president of the privately funded company."
So it's just a demo. Only generates 60KW. Not clear if that's average or max power; probably max. On days with low surf, not much will happen.
They've been hyping this since 2004. There are better wave powered generation devices, and even the best ones are commercial flops.
why there an "oil" tag on this one?
sure, they probably can't operate it while there's the oil issue in the gulf....though, I wonder if their reverse-osmosis filtration systems can filter out oil.....or the seadog pump that use a "wheel" (also wonder if those "wheels" are like a centrifuge)
even if it can't...send Kevin Costner in (rolls sarcastic eyes here), he'll make it work some how.
At least they won't need to worry about greasing anything for several years, but who's going to buy black salt?
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
technically, that's what a fuel cell is.
You could store the tidal energy by cracking the water H20 into H2 and O2 and then use it in a fuel cell.
But each conversion process means you lose part of the energy.
And since they need non-brackish drinking water, making it directly is more efficient.
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An interesting idea... but just because something is clean and self-sustaining, doesn't make it a wise investment. At what rate does this produce fresh water, and how much does it cost to build? It sounds clever, but would it actually be more efficient than a traditional desalination powered by solar, or even nuclear power?
I hope it works well, but too many of these ideas simply cost too much for too little.
The fact that they will build large installations in areas which are essential to the ecosystem. Many species of fish, shrimp, and crab in the Gulf need coastal marshes and mangroves to breed.
Here they are talking about something small you can put into place remote from the grid and you are suggesting a technology that is best at very large scales?
There is also no such thing as "traditional desalination" yet but a nice try at emotional manipulation there.
Do you write this for every new technology and just change two or three words? It just doesn't quite fit in this situation but looks very familiar.
how many people have to wave at it in order for it to work?
How is this any different from the De-sal plants that run on oil?
Respect the Constitution
whoosh
INRI, really?
hey, if it works, I'm all for it...
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Any reverse osmosis unit that I have ever seen requires fairly clean sea water to start the process. For example yachts need to be in open water before allowing these units to be started up. Now how will this work with BPs tons and tons of crude oil mixed into the Gulf. One good gulp of oil will foul this new idea completely.
The Gulf of Mexico is now a fuel cell.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
The Navies of the world would like a word with you. There absolutely is "traditional desalination" which typically runs off waste heat on ships. There are many on shore desalination plants in dry parts of the world with natural gas to flare off.
A cost/benefit analysis is reasonable for every new technology. Please include non-financial costs and benefits but do the thinking before going whole hog.
A billion dollar 50kw generator will never be worth building, true anywhere, I mean 10^9 and real (USA) dollars. Even if it produces puppies and butterflies as waste and costs nothing to run.
I don't even know if the ISS power system is that expensive (critiquing my own argument by finding a counter example).
What do they do with the puppies on ISS? Stop it, stop it that's sil
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
There's lots of "traditional" desalination techniques, and it's widely used in regions like the Persian Gulf where supplies of fresh water are limited. You've got everything from evaporative desalination to reverse osmosis which can run on waste heat from power plants or other industrial processes, to reverse-osmosis. And you can easily build a small reverse-osmosis based desalination plant powered by solar. All that takes is some clear skies and a water pump, no need for a complex field installation.
What good is a wave-powered desalination plant that costs $500,000 to construct, when it produces the same amount of fresh-water as a small $50k solar-powered reverse-osmosis device? I have no clue whether those numbers are representative, which is why I ask the question in the original post.
In summary, you're a fucking idiot.
I think you'll find they would never dream of calling it such a thing, and instead call it "distillation".
I'm just calling the above poster to task for the usual NIMBY luddite bullshit and raising emotive questions in such a way as to demonstate he has absolutely no clue and didn't even fully read the article summary.
So you don't read the article summary, don't notice it is reverse-osmosis but rave on about that later, make up some numbers with one deliberately large and another deliberately small to make one thing look bad, and then call me an idiot?
I'm simply sick of this mindless questioning luddite bullshit that appears whenever an alternative energy is mentioned, along with what I'm assuming is the clueless "why not nukes, we got them right in 1970 but those damn hippies stopped us" bullshit packaged with it.
You think what they call it makes your argument less wrong?
FYI distillation is one of several methods used for desalination.
The GP poster suggested that a reasoned look at the economics of new technology is appropriate prior to deciding it will/won't save the world. You interpret that as 'NIMBY Luddite bullshit' without bothering to understanding it.
I agree with the sib poster. You are a moron.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'