Earth is an amazing place. A huge rock that hurtles through space in an orbit 93 million miles from the sun, it provides life to countless species including our own. We are the only ones that require energy to power our way of life, and for the last couple hundred years we have used unsustainable fuels that have enabled tremendous progress at a devastating price to our planet.
Lately there has been a small but determined effort to get away from fossil fuels. Wind power and to some degree solar energy has begun to light up our homes and businesses, but there is so much more out there. In the last few years Verdant Energy has sought to place turbines in the East River to capture tidal energy though expectations have not been met. Regardless, Verdant is but one example of the drive for clean energy.
From The Washington Post:
PORTLAND, Ore. -- Oregon Iron Works has the feel of a World War II-era shipyard, with sparks flying from welders' torches and massive hydraulic presses flattening large sheets of metal. But this factory floor represents the cutting edge of American renewable-energy technology.
The plant is assembling a test buoy for Finavera Renewables, a Canadian company that hopes to harness ocean waves off the coast of Oregon to produce electricity for U.S. consumers. And Finavera is not Iron Works' only alternative-energy client: So many companies have approached it with ideas that it has created a "renewable-energy projects manager" to oversee them.
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Finavera's chief executive, Jason Bak, believes he knows how. The equipment his company designed, called AquaBuOY, aims to generate electricity from the vertical motion of waves. The buoy, anchored in an array two to three miles offshore, will convert the waves' motion into pressurized water using large, reinforced-rubber hose pumps. As the buoy goes up the peak of a wave and down into its trough, it forces a piston in the bottom of the buoy to stretch and contract the hose pumps, pushing water through. This drives a turbine that powers a generator producing electricity, which would be shipped to shore through an undersea transmission line.
More than two-thirds of Earth's surface is covered by water. Even with many shipping lanes ferrying goods around the world, there is plenty of room to harness energy from the ocean. Now of course there will be initial problems in getting these new ideas online and weaning ourselves off of oil and coal, but it is very possible. The key is to encourage companies like Finavera to do their important work by having our government and others push the market to stop the disease of oil addiction. Not only is it possible, it is essential.
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