Tidal Energy

[jedder78]

Tidal and Hydro power are surely an underutilised resource:

https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/scotland-floating-turbine-tidal-power-record-sr2000-scotrenewables-ofgem-a8503221.html

With the reliability of tides, you would presume that more countries would be investing heavily and rapidly in this technology.

[studiot]

Agreed +1

In the UK case it is due to a shortsighted series of governments whose attention is focused firmly on its own navel.

The nearest these politicians come to tidal anything is the Thames protection barrier against the tide.

Edited December 8, 2018 by studiot

[jedder78]

8 minutes ago, studiot said:

Agreed +1

In the UK case it is due to a shortsighted series of governments whose attention is focused firmly on its own navel.

The nearest these politicians come to tidal anything is the Thames protection barrier against the tide.

It really is shameful that as the climate suffers more is not being done to utilise this resource. 

On a smaller scale, I also found this that utilises river current.

http://idenergie.ca/en/river-turbine/

Allegedly, it gives the same energy production as 4-10 solar panels which seems quite decent. Could probably be easily replicated too.

[studiot]

Are you aware of the difference between a tide which is the periodic vertical movement of water due to the Moon ( and other) gravities and a tidal stream which is the associated periodic horizontal movement of water which must take place if the water surface moves up and down.

One difference is that using the tide means impounding water behind expensive barrages as the tide spends long time periods not changing much in level,

Whilst a tidal stream is always flowing back or fore.
Better a tidal stream generator does not need any head behind it, the water naturally flows through the turbine.
Nor does it offer obstruction to navigation since it just sits on the bottom.

The bank, StudioT uses financed the world's first such generator at the entrance to Strangford Loch in Ireland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SeaGen

Other advantages are that you can add horizontal generators one at a time and they start producing revenue the moment after installation
With tide generators you have to put in expensive infrastructure first (the barrage) and you don't get any money back until that is finished.

 

Here is another comment.

The UK has large areas of the Atlantic, Irish and North seas within its coastal waters.

It also has a large and increasing number of expensive to decommission redundant oil rigs.

If our pusilanimous government were to designate a suitable parking area for redundant oil rigs they could be parked in a row and have wind or current generators mounted on or under them.

This make further use of them, out of the way.

A further benefit would be that it is expensive to lay lots of cables to bring the generated energy ashore.
Such a parking area could need only a single connection.

 

[jedder78]

3 minutes ago, studiot said:

Are you aware of the difference between a tide which is the periodic vertical movement of water due to the Moon ( and other) gravities and a tidal stream which is the associated periodic horizontal movement of water which must take place if the water surface moves up and down.

One difference is that using the tide means impounding water behind expensive barrages as the tide spends long time periods not changing much in level,

Whilst a tidal stream is always flowing back or fore.
Better a tidal stream generator does not need any head behind it, the water naturally flows through the turbine.
Nor does it offer obstruction to navigation since it just sits on the bottom.

The bank, StudioT uses financed the world's first such generator at the entrance to Strangford Loch in Ireland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SeaGen

Other advantages are that you can add horizontal generators one at a time and they start producing revenue the moment after installation
With tide generators you have to put in expensive infrastructure first (the barrage) and you don't get any money back until that is finished.

 

Here is another comment.

The UK has large areas of the Atlantic, Irish and North seas within its coastal waters.

It also has a large and increasing number of expensive to decommission redundant oil rigs.

If our pusilanimous government were to designate a suitable parking area for redundant oil rigs they could be parked in a row and have wind or current generators mounted on or under them.

This make further use of them, out of the way.

A further benefit would be that it is expensive to lay lots of cables to bring the generated energy ashore.
Such a parking area could need only a single connection.

 

Thanks for the info.

Given the UK's large network of reservoirs, does this have potential too as the water exits the reservoir? Isn't a reservoir basically a dam?

Surely the water companies are sitting on a valuable network of power generation?

[studiot]

3 hours ago, jedder78 said:

Thanks for the info.

Given the UK's large network of reservoirs, does this have potential too as the water exits the reservoir? Isn't a reservoir basically a dam?

Surely the water companies are sitting on a valuable network of power generation?

 

Yes I wish they woulkd have invested some of the North Sea revenues in many more reservoirs like the pumped storage Dinorwig (Wales) and Cruachan (Scotland)

But that would have been too far sighted for our governments.

 

Most dams have a hydrogeneration facility at least for the water supplier's own use.