Like wind turbines, devices intended to extract kinetic energy out of moving water are limited in their generation capacity by their “swept area,” i.e. the area of the imaginary circle made by tips of the blades.
Category: Hydrokinetics
Cost-Effective Renewable Energy Means Device Optimization
Pictured here is a device that combines wind and hydrokinetic energy. Its proponents make the case that there is a strong overlap between the regulations that govern offshore wind and tidal/ocean current energy (which I’m sure is correct) and that …
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From Guest Blogger Emily Folk: What’s the Potential for Hydroelectric Power?
Hydroelectric power is one of the oldest forms of electricity production and the largest renewable energy source in use today. Hydro currently makes up approximately 21 percent of global energy production. Hydroelectric power reached 1,064 gigawatts (GW) of installed capacity …
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Tidal Energy Today: Oregon’s Waves Could Create 1,000 Jobs per 1GW of Deployment
I had to laugh when I saw the headline above. If your criterion for a good energy policy is jobs/Watt, get everyone in America riding grid-connected stationary bicycles, eight hours per day.
More on Wave Energy
In response to my recent post Wave Energy Isn’t Going To Make It, a commenter writes: Wave energy may not be completely finished. Such technologies may not be economic in today’s economic dynamics, but who knows what the future may hold for …
Wave Energy Isn’t Going To Make It
Facebook users who follow renewables are quite accustomed to seeing videos on ocean wave energy, like this one. I have to admit; there is an intuitive appeal to the subject, as we can all visualize the vast power of the …
Powering Your House with Flowing Water: There’s Beauty in that Silver Singin’ River
Here’s a video suggesting that hydrokinetic energy can power your house. Of course it can, but the video is misleading on a couple of levels: 1) It suggests that this technology for converting the kinetic energy in moving water to electrical …
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Tagged with: hydrokinetic energy
New Hydrokinetic Devices: Burden of Proof Is on the Inventor
Here an extremely common occurrence here at 2GreenEnergy: the submission of an idea from an inventor with a patent but no working model of the device. Like so many others of this type, I respond:
Exec Turnover in the Wave Energy Industry Raises Suspicions
Nowadays, everyone’s alert to “fake news”; no one wants to be duped by deliberate lies that wind up in our media. But, of all the different types of stories we come across each day, perhaps the most dubious are those …
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Tidal Energy Has One Key Disadvantage
Here’s a good article for those looking for an introduction to tidal energy, though it sugar-coats the subject of costs. The author writes: “Once it’s installed in the ocean, it functions cost-competitively to other forms of renewable energy.”
