new use for old fishing boat

Now this is a clever idea:

Anchored off the coast of Norway is an old retired fishing trawler which has a new use: it generates electricity. Its bow has been custom re-built to accommadate four large chambers. As the waves strike the boat, the water level in the chambers rises. This creates an increase in air pressure which in turn drives four turbines – one for each chamber.

None of the moving parts are in direct contact with salt water. In fact, the only moving parts are the turbines, which are installed above the vessel's deck. The pitch of the vessel also contributes by generating additional air pressure in the chambers when the wave height is large. The chambers are designed to work in different wave height conditions, which means that the energy is exploited very effectively. It’s also been equipped with a special anchoring system which means that it is always facing into the incoming waves.

The nominal capacity of the plant is 4 x 50kW – 200kW in total; capable of producing 320,000 kWh of electricity per year.

The project is the work of a Norwegian company called Havkraft, which has ambitious plans for the future: to install 20 of the turbines on a re-built barge. The barge would produce 1 megawatt of power and could be scaled up into large fleets of floating power plants producing many megawatts of cheap offshore energy.

So based on the American average, this thing could power 32 homes?

Energy with no emissions or cost of fuel, repurposes an old ship, isn't ugly, is smaller than other "green" power plants, is mobile, provides cover for aquatic life... I like it.

Every Norwegian citizen gets a share of the North Sea oil profits but with prices plummeting they can do with more.

Quote: Face

Energy with no emissions or cost of fuel, repurposes an old ship, isn't ugly, is smaller than other "green" power plants, is mobile, provides cover for aquatic life... I like it.

It's a neat idea. I recall many (three?) a summer at a beach somewhere thinking that perhaps waves could be used to produce useful energy.

But.

What are the downsides? Cost? Maintenance? Dependability? Tides? What happens in a storm? That kind of thing.

I had a co=worker about 25 years ago that was working on a method to produce power based on gravitational pull. He was a physics and mathematics graduate and everything he was telling me was so abstract that it was way over my head. This is what it turned into.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_power

Using the pressure of the oceans depth
could be a way to make lots of electric
very cheaply.

Quote: Evenbob

Using the pressure of the oceans depth
could be a way to make lots of electric
very cheaply.

Care to elaborate?

While the pressure is immense, I don't see the connection. It may be immense, but it's mostly static. A way I could see "using" pressure would be to have something which traverses different depths, moving up and down within a column of water. But I imagine this process in and of itself would cost a lot of energy.

This is just one.

http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Using-Water-Pressure-at-the-Bottom-of-the-Ocean-to-Store-Energy.html

Quote: Evenbob

This is just one.

http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Using-Water-Pressure-at-the-Bottom-of-the-Ocean-to-Store-Energy.html

Ooof. That's gonna take several readings to understand. Play through, boys.

Quote: Evenbob

This is just one.

http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Using-Water-Pressure-at-the-Bottom-of-the-Ocean-to-Store-Energy.html

This doesn't generate electricity. This stores energy where it's been generated elsewhere for later use. Which is a pretty important problem to solve for many renewable sources. It's a pretty neat answer on the face of it.

There's a reservoir in France (?) that is used as a battery... water is pumped back up into it when it's cheap and plentiful, then the hydro electric plant is run when a power surge is needed.

Molten salt towers are another way of storing energy long term.