Happy Thursday! We like to hear about interesting Energy topics and here’s one we don’t hear about much: Marine Energy and its potential to help the blue economy!
Did anyone
happen to read the EERE Energy Innovation News Newsletter on December 5,
2024, they published the DOE’s press release titled, “U.S Department of Energy
Invests More Than $18 Million in Marine Energy and Offshore Wind Research”? In the article, it spoke on Department of
Energy (DOE) made a statement in regard to them awarding $18 million of federal
funds to 27 Research & Development (R&D) proposals from 17 universities
in the hope to innovate and improve marine energy and offshore wind technologies
and their costs. Marine energy is energy
which may be made by harnessing the power of our waterways like rivers and
tides and even the different makeups of them, temperature and its compression
force at different depths. It has been
determined the U.S. has the potential to increase our energy production by up
to 60%, if we take advantage of marine energy.
Offshore wind has the possibility of making 2.8 terawatts of energy, if
we expand it, nonetheless both of these energies need improvements, innovation
and cost reductions and this is where our universities come into play with
their ability bring creative thinking to the table, they have been given the
opportunity to help Americans make the next step for clean energy.
The universities
had their proposals picked under several headings. The first group were awarded over $2 million,
and these three universities will use “generated publicly available data and
test platforms and help identify cost reductions and performance improvements
to advance marine energy devices.”
Another four universities were awarded over $1.6 million, and they will “help
advance potential synergies between offshore wind and/or marine energy and
aquaculture.” The next group has seven
universities, and they were awarded almost $3.5 million, and they will use their
awarded monies to support their “undergraduate senior design and/or research
projects in marine energy.” Two Texas
Universities were in this group and they are Texas A&M Engineering
Experiment Station and University of Houston, and they were awarded $500,000
each to advance their programs. The last
and largest group has eight universities, and they were awarded over $10
million, and their proposals were picked to “help advance additional ideas that
support the Water Power Technologies Office’s (WPTO) Marine Energy Program and its goals.” These universities
were chosen to help bring innovation and improvements to the ‘What’s next?’ for
marine and offshore wind energy as well as the blue economy which will help
reduce water locked land produce their own energy and reduce emissions. We wish them luck finishing their
qualifications for these funds! If you
would like to read more of EERE Newsletter’s DOE's Announcement, please
click the link: U.S. Department of Energy Invests More Than $18 Million in Marine Energy and Offshore Wind Research at Universities | Department of Energy.
If you would
like to learn more about the DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency &
Renewable Energy’s WPTO, please click the link: Water Power Technologies Office | Department of Energy.
If you would
like help in looking into how to move your liquids and use renewables to help
clean up your emissions, contact us via the email in the Blog and check out our
ESC website!
We hope you have a wonderful evening!