MeanGene Rants 1
June 2002
La Buffadora, The First Hyrdogen Powered Island, and the First
All- Hyrdrogen Economy.
Cool Stuff
·
Lighting
up Nepal
Dr. Dave Irvine-Halliday, an
engineering professor at the University of Calgary, has developed a home
lighting system for the developing world using a combination of white LEDs,
pedal generators and rechargeable batteries. This type of
"pico-power" can make a huge difference in the lives of villagers in
rural areas where being connected to a power grid is not an option and probably
never will be. Read about the Light Up the World project and make a
donation." The organization: http://www.lightuptheworld.org/
The white LED http://www.lightuptheworld.org/Pages/Wled.htm
Yet
another renewable form of energy from the sun is wave energy. "Wave energy
conversion takes advantage of the ocean waves caused primarily by interaction
of winds with the ocean surface." "As of the mid-1990s, there were
more than 12 generic types of wave energy systems. Some systems extract energy
from surface waves. Others extract energy from pressure fluctuations below the
water surface or from the full wave. Some systems are fixed in position and let
waves pass by them, while others follow the waves and move with them. Some
systems concentrate and focus waves, which increases their height and their
potential for conversion to electrical energy." (source http://www.energy.ca.gov/development/oceanenergy/
) Today, we bring you two different systems for converting wave energy into
electricity, and curiously enough, both involve the same Scottish Island,
"Islay".
The
Limpet 500 is an onshore wave system that works on the same principles that
occur naturally in a "blowhole" or "una buffadora" as the
Spanish would say. Water rushing in from a wave pushes air out of a cavity. In
a blowhole, the water ultimately is squeezed out a tiny opening in the cavity
making a large spray. In the Limpet 500, the rushing air is made to spin a
turbine, which generates electricity. As the water rushes back out, air rushes
back in, again spinning the turbine. Through very clever design, whether the
air is going in or out, the Wells Turbine will spin the same way, making
electrical generation more efficient than it would be if the turbine stopped
and then spun in the other direction. http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1032000/1032148.stm This half-megawatt system is in place on the
Scottish island of Islay. (See a real picture http://www.wavegen.com/new10.htm)
The Scottish claim this could be the next big thing. http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/scotland/newsid_1025000/1025528.stm Though no plans are in place, California
offers a lot of potential http://www.energy.ca.gov/development/oceanenergy
A second
wave energy system positioned off shore or near shore is the Pelamis from Ocean
Power Delivery Ltd. http://www.oceanpd.com/ The Pelamis looks like a snake
riding the waves. It uses hyrdaulic rams to pump high-pressure oil through
hydraulic motors to resist the motion of the waves. The motors drive electrical
generators which send electricity down an umbilical cord to the ocean floor.
The power of several Pelamises (Pelami?) combine and send energy back to shore
in a single cable. If you read the above and still don't understand how it
works, join the club. The blowhole was so much simpler. The pictures might help
- click around on their site. http://www.oceanpd.com/ They even have cool Quick
Time videos of them operating in the Firth of Forth. A 750kW Pelamis would be
150 m long and 3.5 m in diameter. An array of 40 could provide enough power for
20,000 homes. "The company has won a bid for a 750kW project off Islay,
Scotland under the Scottish Renewables Obligation and has recently signed a
memorandum of understanding with BC Hydro to develop a 2 MW project off the
coast of Vancouver Island, Canada."
So what
is going on at Islay in Scotland? They have two major wave projects underway.
The Island now has a goal of being the first Island to use entirely Hyrdogen
power. They will use electricity from their various wave machines to capture
hydrogen from water through electrolysis. The hydrogen will be put into fuel
cells to power both cars and buildings. http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/archive/15-5-19102-0-17-14.html
But Iceland is well set to become the world's first hydrogen economy. http://www.lv.is/lv.nsf/pages/hydrogen_society-ens.html.
Don't underestimate them, these guys invented the GNU/Linux kernel.