 | The Four Day Work Week: Sixteen Reasons Why This Might Be an Idea Whose Time Has Come | The Oil Drum | DrumBeat: May 3, 2008 |  |
46 comments on Solving Our Water Problems - Desalination Using Solar Thermal Power
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
| Show without comments | PDF version
46 comments on Solving Our Water Problems - Desalination Using Solar Thermal Power
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
| Show without comments | PDF version
User login
Contact
- anz at theoildrum dot com
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Archives
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
GAIA Host Collective
I have often thought that the mechanical engineering in and around ocean power, wave/tidal, should be focused directly on de-sal instead of generating electricity then driving de-sal process.
Oregon State University here is a considered to be at the center of wave energy development yet when I talked to several of the exhibitors at the last expo they acted like no one even considers anything other that the holy grail, the golden ring, the license to print $ that is generating electricity.
We need water more than we need juice.
It seems that the thinking in a lot of R&D, both public and private, is that it's all about the first person(s) to discover the "next big energy thing" will be rich and famous.
While that might be true, IMO we are wasting a lot of time, money, and brain power here when we could be building things that address the issues at hand.
souper- are you saying that water is the new oil?
Agreed - the combination of wave power and desalination makes a lot of sense.
I touched on a few Australian companies exploring this idea in my ocean energy post a while back (http://anz.theoildrum.com/node/3643).
Energetech / OceanLinx
http://www.abc.net.au/water/stories/s1578192.htm
SeaPower Pacific / Carnegie Corp
http://www.abc.net.au/ra/innovations/stories/s1997871.htm
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/17/2062006.htm?section=business
And the OTEC process also does desalination as a side benefit.
I'm not sure that wave power is that big a factor in the south of Australia, though I could be wrong.
What it does have in its favor is relatively warm water for most of the year. A far better combo (IMO) in that location would be to employ the Atmospheric Vortex Engine instead of waves to generate the required power. The AVE generates power by harvesting it from the Convective Available Potential Energy (CAPE) in the troposphere, which I suspect might be quite high in the region, especially during the summer.
In the case of multi-effect evaporation using concentrated solar, it would also be able to harvest the waste heat given off at 40-50 C at the end of the train.
For those of you who might be worried that this is another "Enviromission"--rest easy. Though it's based on the same principle, it does not require that a huge tower be built, that someday might be blown down, nor a huge "skirt" to trap solar energy. See www.vortexengine.ca for more details.
The southern ocean usually seems pretty rough to me, but some of the wave energy charts don't show it as unusually so.
The water there is quite cold (at least compared to the rest of the country).
I speak from personal experience, it is, or at least it can look that way from the deck.
Sustainablility Victoria (browser may need to be IE) has an interactive site for the Vic coast which shows parts of Tassie and SA. Once you get into Bass straight the wave potential goes down a bit.
It's hard to judge from the colour scheme but the chart indicates ~50kW/m from the Great Ocean Road (Otways) to about Beachport in SA.
Mind you, I have nothing with which to compare that number... is that high or low? (Apart from calculating that 20 km = 1 GW, if you could capture it)
Also, what is the practical upper limit. Ie you could site your infrastructure where there are very energetic waves, but that then increases the risks of loss and failure.
Is it that a more consistant intermediate "predictable" swell is preferred?