Wave energy is a form of renewable energy source generated by the ocean’s wave, and potentially could be used to generate electricity, as well as the free source of energy used for water purification.
The World Energy Council estimated that around 2 terawatts (2 million megawatts) could be produced from the oceans via wave power. This is figure is two times higher than the current world electricity production. It is also estimated that 1 million gigawatt hours of wave energy hits Australian shores annually [1]. Note that wave power is to be differentiated with tidal power [2], which is based on the tidal movement due to relative motion of moon and earth .
Wave energy generation is suitable to be implemented Western Australia, since our wave current is quite strong. Other part of Australia that has strong wave current is Tasmania and eastern side of South Australia. This is quite interesting, since most of the aquaculture industry are located around this area.
There is one Western Australian company called CETO, which is having the technology to harvest the energy from the ocean’s wave for water purification and power generation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V27ZBODcv0c
Perhaps, CETO technology could be used to help aquaculture industry.
[1] CETO: http://www.ceto.com.au
[2] Tidal Power: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_power
Tags: Energy for Aquaculture industry, Renewable Energy, Water purification, Wave energy
Posted in Environment, Hatchery R&D, Innovation, Investment, Open Innovation, Technology, Value-add. Permalink for this post: permalink.
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Another project that harvest wave energy is called Pelamis, which has a project in Portugal to generate electricity from wave energy.
Recently on 23rd of September 2008, the world’s first wave farm was officially opened by Portuguese Minister of Economy. It can generate 2.25 Megawatt, which is capable of providing electricity to up to 1500 homes.
More about Pelamis:
http://www.pelamiswave.com/
Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelamis_wave_energy_converter
Just a second thought after looking at Pelamis: Could we place fish tank inside pelamis tank? Or perhaps just beside it, or attach offshore cage beside Pelamis system
Have a look at Youtube video on Pelamis:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TSmYmV23W0
With both open ocean aqua culture and wave energy devices site selection is very important. One potential issue I see is that the wave energy devices want large steady waves, whereas aquaculture tend to want quieter waters where damage to plant and equipment is not a problem.
Perhaps for some fish farmers (for tuna or yellowtail kingfish industry), they need strong currents to grow the fish…
this reminds me of one article in the link that Andrew sent us before:
http://www.forbes.com/technology/2008/09/23/aquaculture-fish-farms-tech-sciences-cz_jf_0924fish.html
One of the Perth based company named GB Energy in collaboration with Australian Sustainable Energy Corporation Pty Ltd (ASEC) is in the process of patenting this ocean waves into renewable energy. It is in an early stage of development, however the scope of the technology has the potential to provide significant, consistent, and low cost energy from the oceans of the world.
I agree that most wave energy systems appear to be more likely suited to deep open ocean aquaculture, since the higher energy waves would be present there. This is also a good thing for those types of aquaculture since more automation would be required as well as remote monitoring and communications equipment.
Does anyone know of wave energy systems that are specifically designed to operate in calmer waters? They might be more effective in this type of aquaculture activity.
The other limitation I see with this is that renewable energy requires a large up front investment. When this cost is combined with the other up front investments required in aquaculture, the costs may be too high.
Finavera Renewables have come up with patented offshore wave energy conversion technology which is designed in terms of wave parks (AquaBuOY Arrays Technology). The operating capacity can vary from 100kWatts to 100MWatts of energy. Another distinctive characteristic is it can withstand harsh weather conditions with its advanced anchoring and mooring mechanism. AquaBuOY can live through 100 years of storms. Video about how the technology works can be found on following link:
http://www.finavera.com/en/wavetech/aquabuoymovie
Combining wave energy production with aquaculture grow-out cages would reduce variable costs for maintinence and service for each. Thus it makes sense. However, the systems would need to be far offshore so that the wave energy systems do not affect costal formation. Coastal formation is created by waves action. If wave action is reduced, the shape of coasts may be affected. By locating the systems far off shore, this would be averaged away. Has anyone seen any study into this?
Budi
Interesting that you picked out the CETO technology as an example of harnessing tidal energy – their office is next door to mine!
The ocean energy industry is (pardon the pun) awash with ideas for making electricity from moving water but it is still reaching for a toehold in the commercial world. Aquaculture is just one of many applications for which ocean energy holds great promise.
You might be interested to check out a report(released last month) from Greentech Media and the Prometheus Institute for Sustainable Development.
http://www.greentechmedia.com/GreentechMedia/Report/ForecastingtheFutureofOceanPower.html
It addresses the underlying fundamentals that will determine when ocean power technologies will become competitive with other renewable and traditional energy sources, what technologies will bring the industry to that point, and how investment, government policies and power sector buy-in will drive the growth of this industry.
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