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New Scottish Wave Energy Generator Unveiled
MikeChino writes "We've learned about Scotland's wave energy initiatives in the past, and just this morning the nation unveiled Aquamarine Power's next-generation Oyster 800 wave power plant. The new generator can produce 250% more power at one third the cost of the first full-scale 315kw Oyster that was installed in Orkney in 2009. The device's shape has been modified and made wider to enable it to capture more wave energy, and a double seabed pile system allows for easier installation."
"A farm of just 20 Oyster 800 devices would generate sufficient power for up to 15,000 homes"
or... 1 device can power 750 homes.
If those numbers are correct for the original, and the summary is correct with its "250% more power at one third the cost", that would drop the new version to $11,000 / 3.5 / 3 = $1,047/kW, less than what you quote for coal (disregarding operating costs, which I have no idea of). Unless they mean the 250% extra works out to one-third the per-Watt cost, which would imply $11,000 / 3 = $3666, not bad but a bit pricey. Don't know which cost TFA refers to (old system or new one); anybody know?
Perhaps the pendulum should swing in the other direction? I laugh at the stereotypes of my ancestors (Polish and Irish top the list). Perhaps everyone needs to lighten up and laugh at the things that make us different instead of flying off the handle and getting offended.
TL;DR: lighten up, life's too short.
Women are like electronics: you don't know how damaged they are until you try to turn them on.
However, it's a myth that stainless steel is the best thing for salt water. It is fine for above-deck use because it gets washed clean by freshwater in rain. But the interesting ingredients of seawater can cause pinholing and stress corrosion in stainless steels, though A4/316 is better than most. Bronze (tin/copper alloy) is good and is traditionally used for throughhulls and seacocks. The usual solution (pun intended) is of course not to let seawater near any working fluid circuits but to use either hydraulic oils or a mixture of propylene glycol and water (anti-freeze) - use propylene rather than ethylene because it doesn't kill fish if it leaks out.
Corrosion engineering is a really fascinating discipline with many unexpecteds and gotchas.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
As a Scotsman I'm offended at your derogatory and cliched view of my country. The energy is used to power deep-fat fryers, whisky distilleries and cigarette vending machings. Some energy is left over for TV sets in to watch our football team being crushed by all but the tiniest nations.
I know it's bad form to link your your self but i did the work for this last them we talkd about it.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1643562&cid=32116814
well based on what i have read - as the moon/tidal effeects work the earth is slowing down and the moon is gaining potential energy related to earths gravity well by moving farther away - assume this is a colosed energy system..
assume we pull energy out of it.. the moon will come closer to earth (or reduce it's movement away) - so the total energy supply would be the potential energy of the moon in relation to earths gravity well.
PE = m x g x h
m = 7.3477 × 10^22 kg
g = 9.8 m/s2
h = 363,104,000 m (using it's Periapsis)
PE = 2.61461968 × 10^32 Joules
474 × 10^18 = AEC = whole planet annual energy consumption
PE/AEC = 551,607,527,000 years....
so the answer is .. keep current rates.. and assume we could get it all from here.. 550 billion years..
according to this #19
http://helios.gsfc.nasa.gov/qa_sun.html [nasa.gov]
"In about 5 billion more years, the useable hydrogen (not all the hydrogen) will have been converted to helium, and the Sun will start burning helium, and become a red giant."
if i remember right.. if it goes red giant it will grow larger than 1 AU so it will engulf earth..
basically.. we could increase energy consumption by a factor of 100 and only then would we be toying with maybe crashing the moon into us before the sun burns us away.
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'