Wave

New Focus For Ocean Power Following Eco Wave Kiev Tests

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Trying to find the silver bullet in energy is not an easy task. Developing a power source that is clean and widely available, yet also cheaper and more reliable than fossil fuels or intermittent wind and solar has led to a great deal of expensive research but few commercially successful technologies.

Proponents of ocean power, in which converters capture the power of the constant energy provided by high and low waves and tide flows, believe they have the answer – but pricing, infrastructure prejudiced to existing generation types and lack of data all form robust challenges for the still-small sector. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 10, 2012 at 10:30 AM

Wave Power From Down Under (The Water)

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It’s a big island, but it’s still an island. And most of Australia‘s population is within a boomerang’s throw of the water – all of which makes marine-based power generation a potentially important part of the country’s future clean-energy mix. Recognizing this, the Victoria state government is conditionally pumping $5 million into BioPower, bringing the wave power startup closer to the funding needed to demo a 250-kilowatt prototype of its bioWave device.

“We are now ready for the ultimate test – installing the bioWave in high energy 30-metre deep ocean waters,” CEO Timothy Finnigan said in a statement. “We have to raise another $3.6 million to complete the project funding, and given our results to date we are confident of achieving this in the coming months. The technology has been positively assessed by more than a dozen independent reviewers.” Keep reading →

 /  Published December 8, 2011 at 6:00 AM

Ocean Power Means Green Energy For Ireland

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Ireland’s waters are famous for their crashing waves and as the country looks for ways to meet its renewable energy standard of 16% by 2020, these waves are becoming an increasingly important energy resource.

IBM and The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) have announced a joint effort to both understand and minimize the potentially harmful environmental impacts of so-called “wave energy conversion devices.” Chief among the concerns is noise pollution that can disrupt fish migrations and other marine ecosystems. Keep reading →

 /  Published November 2, 2011 at 6:00 AM