Wave Power Fails To Live Up To Promise

the_newsbeagle writes: One of the leading companies developing wave power devices, Ocean Power Technologies, has dramatically scaled down its ambitions. The company had planned to install the world's first commercial-scale wave farms off the coast of Australia and Oregon, but has now announced that it's ending those projects. Instead it will focus on developing next-gen devices. Apparently the economics of wave power just don't make sense yet.

Comments

Golden opportunity missed...

[TiggertheMad]

"A spokesperson for Ocean Power Technologies announced, that after a number of years of testing and development efforts, that Wave farms are a wash."

*ducks* *runs*

Re:Golden opportunity missed...

[Inzkeeper]

It looks like we will need to find a more feasible way to generate electricity from water, dam it.

Oregon...

[Nerrd]

Part of the problem might be that they can't sell the power. The wind farms we currently have are already producing more power than the bonneville power administration is willing to purchase - even though they are under contract to do so.

Re:When doing anything involving the ocean

[MightyYar]

People who have never worked in a marine environment just don't understand this. Seawater is nasty, nasty stuff to anything. Plastic, metal, wood - it doesn't matter. Add a mechanical part and it just becomes a nightmare. The navy, for instance, is continuously painting their ships. As in, they never stop painting them. If you have an offshore wind farm, offshore wave farm, or whatever - you will spend far more on maintenance than you ever do on capital costs. And you have to restrict the technology to proven, overbuilt, and simple. Even titanium will fail in salt water (hydrogen embrittlement)... not a nice place to engineer for.