The Oyster in the waters off Scotland is the only hydro-electric device producing power, according to its maker.
(Credit: Aquamarine Power)Wave energy got a boost with the connection of the Oyster hydro-electric device to the electricity grid in Scotland last Friday.
Aquamarine Power activated the connection of the Oyster in the waters off Orkney, marking one of the few ocean power devices to be producing electricity.
The device is a hydraulic pump operated by a "hinged flap," where a large metal piece moves back and forth from the motion of the waves. The movement moves a hydraulic piston that pumps water underground to a hydro-electric turbine that drives a generator to make electricity.
The peak power output of the Oyster 1 is about two megawatts, depending on the location. The company, which received research funding from the U.K. government, is now working on a second-generation device.
There are a number of technologies being pursued to convert wave or tidal energy into electrical energy, including underwater generators. The advantage of the pump design is that it's relatively simple and many components, such as gear boxes and generators, are not exposed to the water.
Twenty Oysters, which are attached to the seabed at about 10 meters of water, could produce enough electricity to power 9,000 homes in the U.K., according to Aquamarine Power.
In the U.S., the Seadog Pump uses a similar approach of pumping water offshore to a hydro-electric turbine to make electricity.
The Oyster was tested at the European Marine Energy Centre. In the U.S., there is an effort to establish an ocean power research center in southern Massachusetts.
Renew Blue's Seadog pump, which uses wave and tidal power to produce electricity and can be harnessed for desalination, is about to be put to the commercial test off the coast of Texas.
Earlier this month, Renew Blue, a subsidiary of the Minneapolis-based Independent Natural Resources, was granted the first-ever state off-shore wave energy lease from the Texas General Land Office. On Thursday, Renew Blue announced that it has licensed its technology to Texas Natural Resources and that they will partner to develop an off-shore facility for 18 Seadog pumps that will both produce power and desalinate seawater for drinking.
A Renew Blue sketch demonstrating how an 18-pump Seadog plant could work.
(Credit: Independent Natural Resources)Texas Natural Resources plans to build the facility one mile off the coast of Freeport, Texas.
Water produced from the off-shore plant will initially be bottled in compostable plastic bottles produced from corn byproducts. It will be sold under the brand Renew Blue and marketed as "environmentally friendly bottled water."
"However, the greater goal of the Seadog pump field is to demonstrate what the technology can do in providing electricity and clean water at a municipal level to regions all over the world that lack fresh water and energy but have an abundance of ocean waves along their coastline," the companies said.
The project will be a test to see how scalable the technology is for widespread use.
In addition to providing electricity, the plant will initially desalinate 3,000 gallons of water per day and hold 30,000 gallons of fresh water at a time to be transported for bottling. But the plant could be designed to eventually desalinate millions of gallons per day for municipal use, according to statistics provided by both companies.
The Oyster in open position.
(Credit: Aquamarine)A new approach to harnessing the ocean's power for energy is getting some positive attention.
The Oyster, a giant oscillating device developed by Aquamarine Power that uses hydraulic technology to convert wave power into electricity, won the "Innovator of 2009" award from Britain's Renewable Energy Association in June.
Then on July 15 the Edinburgh, Scotland-based company was awarded 60 million pounds (over $101 million) by the U.K.'s Department of Energy and Climate Change to further develop its device.
Now comes the that the Oyster is set to be installed and working at a test site by this fall, according Aquamarine Power.
Unlike other attempts at ocean power, the Oyster does not use the waves themselves as the force to turn turbines and generate electricity directly with an underwater generator. Instead, the wave power is harnessed to activate a series of pistons in the Oyster to vigorously pump ocean water to shore through an underwater pipeline. A conventional hydro-electric generator is then used to convert what has become a high-pressure water source into electricity.
The simple approach, which has been tried in other forms by projects like the Seadog Pump, is thought to be more scalable.
The Oyster will be installed at European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) by Fugro Seacore in the waters of the Orkney Islands, the series of islands off northern Scotland where the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean come together.
Preliminary studies on the device conducted in wave pools showed that 10 Oysters could supply power to about 3,000 homes, according to statistics provided by Aquamarine Power.
- RWE NPower tests carbon capture in the U.K.--SmartPlanet.com
Carbon storage next to coal plant plan moving ahead in the U.K. A report suggests this could be done at large scale by 2030. - Hydrogen as automotive fuel--NYTimes.com
Another reality check on hydrogen transportation. Worth noting that during a panel at EmTech on green transportation Wednesday, the word "hydrogen" was never said. - First U.S. carbon auction results to come out Monday--Reuters
The U.S dips its toes into carbon emissions trading with the Northeast RGGI regime. - Pelamis starts Portugal wave-power farm--Cleantech Group
A Pelamis wave-power machine, if you recall, was part of Google's floating data center patent. - Top 10 green-tech venture fundings of 2008 (so far)--Greentech Media
Amazing--the deals are big numbers and almost all solar related, covering multiple technologies. - Dell driving transition to energy-efficient LED displays--press release
Dell gets its green on, some more: these LEDs use less electricity and are more easily recycled. - Solar panels are vanishing, only to reappear on the Internet--NYTimes.com
An installer looked at me funny last year when I asked about thievery. Now it seems this is a serious problem. Best solution appears to be cameras and alarms. - OPT deploys PowerBuoy for first commercial wave power project with Iberdrola--press release
Spanish renewable energy heavyweight Iberdrola will install a wave power turbine able to pump over 1 megawatt into the Spanish grid.
A sampling of green-tech news with quick commentary.
Iberdrola takes the plunge with wave power.
(Credit: Iberdrola)Google sees the future of computing at sea.
The search giant has filed a patent for a "floating data center" that uses wave motion to power on-board computers and the ocean's water to cool them.
The patent was submitted in February last year but was spotted in the U.S. Patent & Trademark office's electronic filings and posted at Slashdot on Saturday.
The system Google engineers sketch out is a self-powered data center placed three to seven miles offshore, potentially operating off the grid. Standard shipping containers would house racks of computers that could be transported by truck and placed onto a boat by crane.
Full steam ahead! An image from Google's patent application for a floating data center that uses wave and tidal power generators.
(Credit: Google)A wave-power generator would be the primary source of electricity. But wind turbines could be used to, for example, run water pumps and a tidal power generator could be used in rivers.
The patent specifies the use of a so-called Pelamis machine, which uses pontoons with pumps to convert wave motion into electricity. A British company, Pelamis Wave Power, is operating a prototype in Scotland and intends to install one off Portugal.
Google engineers calculate that an array of pontoons spread over a square kilometer (a bit more than a half mile) could produce 30 megawatts of electricity, enough to operate a single system.
Also envisioned is equipment to use the direct current electricity to run DC-capable computers, which some people consider more energy-efficient than using alternating current.
Server makers and data center operators are already circulating water to cool computing gear. Google's patent application envisions using the ocean to act as a giant heat sink, cooling computers through seawater-freshwater heat exchangers.
For the crew and operating staff, there could be living quarters and, potentially, a helipad to get there.
Seeking fortunes at sea
With the rising cost of electricity and concerns over the environment, getting cheaper and cleaner forms of electricity is a big concern for data center operators.
Google argues that floating data centers offer other advantages, such as placing computing closer to consumers, cutting down on transmission distances.
"Also, transient needs for computing power may arise in a particular area. For example, a military presence may be needed in an area, a natural disaster may bring a need for computing or telecommunication presence in an area until the natural infrastructure can be repaired or rebuilt," according to the patent application.
Google is not the only company to envision modular, container-based data centers or even floating data centers.
A San Francisco company, International Data Security (IDS), plans to pack discarded cargo ships with computing equipment.
The company intends to have its data center ships placed near urban centers and have one operating by the third quarter of this year.
According an IDS company blog, the primary motivation for IDS's floating data center is the higher cost of building a land-based facility, the resistance to earthquakes and other natural disasters, and the potential to tap water cooling.
"It seems (Google's) plan is slightly different than IDS; IDS floating data centers will be anchored in port the majority of the time, whereas Google's will be positioned out at sea," according to a company blog post on Saturday.
The financial model of operating a data center at sea may be the most clever aspect to the patent application, argues Larry Dignan, editor-in-chief at ZDNet. In theory, a floating data center would not have to pay any property taxes, he said.
Rich Miller at Data Center Knowledge said the Google plan could invoke different legal definitions of territory boundaries.
"The offshore location also raises interesting questions about jurisdiction, and which laws would govern the handling of any consumer data managed from the floating data centers. U.S. territorial waters typically extend 12 nautical miles, but other nations' claims range from 3 miles (Singapore) to 200 miles," he wrote.
MENLO PARK, Calif.--Back and forth, back and forth. That's the idea behind WaveRoller.
The company, based in Espoo, Finland, says it has devised a way to generate electricity from waves without buoys or other floating devices, the mainstay of other wave power companies.
This 4x4 meter plate was the first prototype.
(Credit: WaveRoller)Instead, the company wants to plant oscillating fiberglass/steel plates on the sea bed. Waves rolling in push over the plates, which rebound after the wave passes to only be knocked down by another wave. The back-and-forth motion of the plates drives a piston and creates hydraulic pressure. The pressure ultimately gets fed to a turbine to generate electricity.
By being completely submerged, WaveRoller's device could help quell some of the NIMBY-ism that comes with building in coastal areas, CEO Tuomo Hyysalo said in an interview during a break at the Nordic Green conference here earlier this week. It also makes the device less prone to being an obstacle for boats. Ideally, the 4-meter-high plates will be anchored in water 10 meters to 12 meters deep.
Some wave power devices--such as the buoys being developed by WaveBob and Finavera Renewables--are fairly unobtrusive. They sit far offshore and can be lit so boats can navigate around them. Others, however, are quite large. The Pelamis from Pelamis Wave Power, for example, is a 120-meter segmented device that looks like a giant orange sea snake. Others, like the Limpet, are large cement structures anchored to the shore.
WaveRoller installed a second prototype off the coast of Peniche, Portugal, earlier this year and this summer will begin to collect data on how well the plates perform. If all goes well, the company hopes to start producing systems commercially and helping power providers build multi-megawatt power plants in five to seven years or so. (Other wave companies are similarly aiming at producing power with commercial-size devices in the 2010 to 2015 time frame.)
Glug, glug. WaveRoller No. 2 off the coast of Portugal this year.
(Credit: WaveRoller)"The mayor of Peniche is a surfer and he loves it," said Hyysalo, adding that surfers are often some of the biggest opponents. They fear that wave power devices will sap the strength of waves.
The plate in the latest prototype measures 4x4 meters and can generate 10 kilowatts to 13 kilowatts of power. Commercial units will likely consist of three plates lined up near each other and produce around 45 kilowatts, he said. Thus, you'd need about 22 three-plate devices for a megawatt. A single WaveBob can produce more than a megawatt of power.
Wave power, at least according to its advocates, could become a staple in renewable energy over the next two decades. Waves are far more predictable than wind and solar conditions. Satellites can track wave trains out at sea and give utilities and power providers advance estimates of how much power they can hope to generate from the sea. Water is 800 times denser than air; thus, a few devices planted in a relatively small area can generate as much power as a large wind farm.
Ireland, Scotland, Hawaii, Oregon, and some South Pacific nations are already, or are preparing, wave energy tests.
An artist's rendering of WaveRoller's device.
(Credit: WaveRoller )But there is the catch. Wave power devices have to sit in some of the harshest environments on the planet and function fairly flawlessly to be economical. Right now, virtually all wave power systems are prototypes.
Being completely submerged could potentially become an advantage in this department. Historically, marine engineers have built structures so that they sit above the wave line, like oil derricks, or beneath it. Building devices that are supposed to live on the surface of waves "goes against every instinct of mankind," joked James Ryan, who manages strategic planning and development services for wave power at Ireland's Marine Institute, in a recent interview.
Still, maintenance and repairs are going to be one of the big challenges for WaveRoller, Hyysalo acknowledged. Could these plates break loose or get frozen in place? Sure.
So how does WaveRoller get its plates down there? The construction area is isolated from the rest of the sea and then drained.
"It is like building a bridge," Hyysalo said.
An artist's rendering of the company's wave system
(Credit: Orecon)Right now, wave power is in the early experimental stages, but venture capitalists are lining up to be on the ground floor.
Orecon has lined up $24 million in funding from Advent Ventures, Venrock, Wellington Partners and Northzone Ventures to build a full scale prototype of its wave power machine and, if the results are positive, move toward commercial deployment.
The U.K.-based Orecon has devised a large-scale buoy for harvesting power from waves. In a nutshell, waves striking the device create pressure in a chamber, which is used to turn a turbine and create electricity. A single device will be capable of producing up to 1.5 megawatts of power. Orecon's system in part is based around the engineering devised to build offshore oil rigs. The system will produce power for a minimum of 25 years, the company says.
That's similar to the buoy being built by Ireland's WaveBob. WaveBob has a 1/4 scale prototype in the waters off Galway now and hopes to insert a full-scale device, which will produce over one megawatt of power, in the water in the next few years.
Most wave systems produce far less power--maybe 250 kilowatts. Although smaller devices are cheaper to make, larger devices have certain advantages. For one thing, because they are large, they can survive rugged seas better. Each device also produces more power, which means fewer devices and potentially less maintenance.
Both the UK and Ireland want to build local wave industries and harvest energy from the sea. Both countries bear the brunt of strong waves that cross the Atlantic. WaveBob CEO Andrew Parish also pointed out in a recent interview that this section of the Atlantic is awash in maritime engineering know-how.
Still, wave energy, like tidal energy, remains mostly in the potential stage because of the environmental challenges and the costs. Over the next two to three years, expect to see larger prototypes and more testing. Commercially produced wave power may begin to start crossing the grid sometime between 2010 and 2015.
It is interesting to see Venrock in the deal. The firm mostly concentrates on more exotic technologies that could go commercial. Recently, it has put money into fusion and clean diesel.
Finavera's AquaBuoy prototype is asleep in the deep.
The company placed a 72-foot-long buoy in the waters off of Oregon in September as part of an ongoing effort to assess the commercial potential for wave power. The buoy, however, sunk in 115 feet of water on October 27, according to a report on RenewableEnergyAccess.com.
The AquaBuoy under construction
(Credit: Finavera Renewables)"It seems to have something to do with the float section of the device," Myke Clark, a Finavera employee, told the Web site. After water started coming in, the bilge pump couldn't get rid of the water fast enough.
T'is true, mate. T'is true.
The company has planned later trials where buoys will be hooked up to the grid.
Finavera is one of several companies putting wave and tidal power prototypes in the sea around the world. One chief criticism has been that these devices can't hold up to the raging environment of the sea.
The company will now try to figure out how to get it out of the water, which may not take place until next year.
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