On occasion, Oil & Gas Journal editors receive news of alternative fuels, new energy sources, or "breakthrough" technologies.
These news items run the gamut from those with pie-in-the-sky claims to those receiving significant research and development funding. The former are usually relegated to the trashcan, but occasionally they offer either comic relief or absolute stupefaction.
One e-mail press release a few months ago featured a technology that can convert any combustion engine so that it can "run on virtually any liquid and run pollution-free." The conversion kit allegedly allows engines to run on nonflammable fuels, including water.
A prototype motor allegedly emits an exhaust that is 99% pollution free and actually exhausts "high levels of oxygen," allowing one safely to breathe the exhaust. That must be some interesting stoichiometry.
The most interesting thing about the item was that the rights to the technology were being sold on eBay, an internet auction marketplace. Something tells me the next great transformative invention—akin to the printing press, telephone, automobile, etc.—is not going to be something offered up first on eBay.
But enough about that.
Making waves
In September, four organizations joined forces to develop wave and tidal renewable energy in response to a £50 million grant from the UK government.
The partners formed the UK Centre for Marine Renewable Energy. The partnership aims to establish a research, development, test, and certification base to help the emerging marine energy industry provide renewable energy from naturally occurring wave and tidal movements.
The four organizations include the University of Edinburgh, the Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen, the European Marine Energy Centre in Orkney, Scotland, and the New and Renewable Energy Centre in Northumberland, UK.
According to the Renewables Obligation introduced in April 2002, the UK government is encouraging growth in the use of renewable energy sources for electric power generation. The UK has set goals of 10% of its energy supply from renewable sources by 2010, and 20% by 2020. Renewable energy sources include wind, bioenergy, solar, hydroelectric, and tidal energy.
The use of tidal energy is actually older than the oil and gas industry. It dates back to 1100 AD, when tide mills along the coast of France, Spain, and the UK used waves for energy.
Compared to other alternative energy sources, such as solar and wind, tides rise and fall in a predictable pattern and are therefore more reliable, according to Alastair Newton, director of investment for UK Trade & Investment USA.
Surrounded on all sides by water, the UK has taken the lead in promoting tidal and wave energy, as evinced by the September grant.
The US, however, is also developing wave energy projects. New York City is implementing a system that uses six "underwater windmills" that will reportedly produce enough electricity to power more than 8,000 homes by 2006. Arlington, VA.-based Verdant Power LLC deployed a prototype turbine system in the East River in December 2002 to January 2003.
The tidal currents in that location reach about 4 knots, one of the fastest flows of any waterway on the US East Coast. Verdant received a $1 million grant for the project, sponsored by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, as well as other agencies.
In November 2003, the California Public Utilities Commission issued a final environmental report. San Francisco is reportedly exploring a long-term energy plan that calls for renewable resources like solar and tidal energy to power the city.
Demos
Other viable tidal-energy sites have been identified in other coastal US states, such as Oregon, Washington, Hawaii, and Maine, for possible demonstration plants to convert offshore wave energy from the ocean into electric power.
Candidate sites must have certain attributes including wave behavior, ocean depth, coastal interconnections to utility grids, and existing local harbor facilities for deployment, retrieval, and servicing of the elongated floating structures.
Although applicable mainly for coastal locales, it will be interesting to see how tidal energy technology progresses and whether it might become the "wave of the future."