Wave and tidal power take big steps forward

E-mail from Anne Marie Harmony at Practical Ocean Energy Management Systems (POEMS): In what is the first example of a U.S. public utility securing a power purchase agreement with an ocean energy company, Clallam County PUD finalized an agreement to purchase electricity generated by an offshore wave energy pilot plant, to be developed by Mercer Island, Washington-based AquaEnergy Group, Ltd. Solar Access HydroVenturi San Francisco's Board of Supervisors voted unanimously on Tuesday to launch a $2 million pilot project to study harnessing wave energy to generate enough electricity to light more than 750 homes in this city of 790,000 residents. San Francisco has not nailed down project funds or formally selected a developer but has been looking at technology developed by HydroVenturi Inc., based in London and Los Gatos, Calif., Westlund said. ENN News Verdant Power Verdant Power has completed a successful alpha test in the East River of New York City, and they will deploy commercial systems at that site in '04. It will ultimately be a 10 megawatt installation. Verdant Power Hydrogen Isn't Always the Renewable It Seems To Be Ever since President Bush announced his hydrogen car initiative in his State of the Union address, hydrogen as a fuel source has received more press. But hydrogen isn't necessarily the renewable energy it's portrayed to be - whether it is or not depends on the underlying source of energy used to produce it. For instance, hydrogen can be produced from offshore technologies such as OTEC as described at this website. And as this article entitled "Renewables Key to Hydrogen Economy" (Brussels May 1, 2003) notes, the success of hydrogen as a renewable in Europe, depends on the successful development of renewable technologies first. Meanwhile, as for trends in the U.S., this column by Dave Zweifel entitled "Big Oil Latches on to Hydrogen" Madison.com (May 5, 2003) notes that it's likely that most hydrogen in the U.S. will come from on-renewable sources such as coal and oil. So at least here in the United States, classifying hydrogen as a renewable isn't quite accurate. -Carolyn Elefant Renewables Offshore From Judith Patten's All-Energy News -WET MCT's crossed fingers pay dividends Late-April the BBC reported that "Marine Current Turbines are hoping for a break in the weather next week to allow the first stage in building a £3m underwater turbine off the Devon coast. They hope that they can start installing an 80-tonne steel pile into the seabed, about a mile offshore from Lynmouth" - those crossed fingers must have worked for Peter Fraenkel reports that "the pile was successfully concreted in place in its hole in the seabed and we're now making good progress with installation". BBC, Devon Wave Dragon testing under way The extensive testing program scheduled for the Wave Dragon prototype over the next 3 years has started. Aalborg University has for the last couple of weeks performed a series of successful calibrations of the various control systems onboard the prototype. Wave Dragon News AquaBuOYs for Denmark and USA AquaEnergy Group has been awarded a Grant from the Danish Energy Authority of $100,000 to be used to further development of offshore ocean wave energy conversion devices - AquaBuOYs. AquaEnergy and Rambøll, Denmark, have signed a cooperation agreement. Clallam County PUD has finalized an agreement to purchase electricity generated by an AquaBuOY pilot plant, consist of four AquaBuOYs in Makah Bay each with an expected capacity to produce 250 KW of electrical power by mid 2004. Aqua Energy Group Help steer a new UK ocean energy resource group The first meeting of the new ocean energy resource group of the Renewable Power Association was held recently; the second meeting will be held at 08.00 on Wednesday 21 May at All-Energy Opportunities in Aberdeen. All are welcome and bacon-butties will be served to the first 20 to arrive! Info from G Hartnell or Tony Trapp TS