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The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today released two nationwide resource assessments showing that waves and tidal currents off the nation's coasts could contribute significantly to the United States' total annual electricity production, further diversify the nation's energy portfolio, and provide clean, renewable energy to coastal cities and communities
DOE Reports Show Major Potential for Wave and Tidal Energy Production Near U.S. Coasts
Seeded on Fri Jan 20, 2012 2:16 PM EST
Article Source: U.S. Department of Energy - EERE- Enjoy this article? Help vote it up the 'Vine.
- Public Discussion (4)
The United States uses about 4,000 terawatt hours (TWh) of electricity per year. DOE estimates that the maximum theoretical electric generation that could be produced from waves and tidal currents is approximately 1,420 TWh per year, approximately one-third of the nation's total annual electricity usage. Although not all of the resource potential identified in these assessments can realistically be developed, the results still represent major opportunities for new water power development in the United States, highlighting specific opportunities to expand on the 6% of the nation's electricity already generated from renewable hydropower resources.
- 1 vote
#1 - Fri Jan 20, 2012 2:16 PM ESTThe United States uses about 4,000 terawatt hours (TWh) of electricity per year. DOE estimates that the maximum theoretical electric generation that could be produced from waves and tidal currents isapproximately 1,420 TWh per year, approximately one-third of the nation's total annual electricity usage.
And that is out of about 37,000 TWh of total energy usage in all forms or 10.8% for electricity of our total energy usage and a potential of 3.8% of our total from wave and tidal. The really interesting fact here is that electricity is about twice as efficient at powering our transportation than an internal combustion engine and about five times more efficient at HVAC when using ground assisted heat pumps.
Traditional fossil fuel electricity production ranges from about 33% (combustion turbine) to close to 60% (co-generation). Electric motor efficiency runs 90% or better. So even in the worst case scenario of 30% efficiency in generating electricity and 90% efficiency in electric motors that gives about 27% overall efficiency. The typical internal combustion engine powered car gets 10 to 15% efficiency. A typical gas or oil heating system is about 80% efficient. A ground assisted heat pump is about 500% efficient in its use of electricity and as above using the worst case scenario of 30% efficiency in electricity generation the over all efficiency of the GAHP is 150% efficient from the primary fuel energy content. That is almost double direct fuel like oil or gas and 5 times that of baseboard electric.
My point is that this 3.8% of total energy consumption that could be supplied by tidal and wave power could easily become 8% or more just by converting our current technologies to electric vehicles and GAHP alone and the increased energy efficiencies these technologies have.
- 1 vote
#2 - Sat Jan 21, 2012 10:35 PM ESTTim... The byproducts from wave, solar, and wind.. even geothermal, hydro.. does not gag the lungs and burn the eyes... which makes it efficient that many people will not have cancer, bad eye sight.. less hospital time saves money.. and a better healthy planet
- 1 vote
Par, agreed. My point is that with modern technologies in efficiency, our energy consumption drops by 30% before we even begin to replace the traditional primary energy sources of oil, natural gas, coal, and nuclear. How much easier will it be to supply all our energy needs with renewables, if they are 30% lower in the first place? And a 30% reduction in the byproducts of traditional primary energy sources is still a vast improvement in quality of life and reduced direct and external costs.
BTW, the 30% reduction comes from assessing the reductions using state of the art efficiencies instead of the worst case efficiencies of 30% I used above. A co-generation plant runs at about 60% instead of 30%. Substitute in hydrogen from periods of excess wind and solar and biofuels from composting or pyrolysis (using the heat generated from the electricity generation process to reach the 500 degrees C need for the process). These biofuels can be run through a SOFC at 35% to 40% efficiency and then through a gas tubing for another 15% to 20% efficiency and then through the pyrolysis unit to heat the biomass and then to the cooling towers or to nearby buildings for heating and hot water (adding about another 10% to the overall efficiency).
The by-products are water and carbon dioxide. The source of this carbon dioxide is atmospheric CO2 that was fixed by plants initially. So the net change in atmospheric CO2 is zero, 0.
The production, transport, and processing of the biomass creates local jobs and income for farmers and land owners. It includes scrub vegetation, grasses, wood, garbage, human and animal sewage, etc. Everything but food stuffs. It drastically reduces landfill volumes and sewage treatment and agricultural manure volumes. The solid by-products of the processes are good fertilizers that cut our need for petrochemical fertilizers.
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