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Old 09-16-2005   #23 (permalink)
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damocles
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Re: A New Manhattan Project for Clean Energy

Quote:
Harvesting power from the Moon is easy.
Nope. Engineering scales are against you.

Quote:
Build a large, shallow dam close to a spot at the coast where the tidal difference is pretty high.
Let high tide fill your dam, and at low tide let the water empty again through an array of turbines.
Because the drop won't be far enough to really make it worthwhile in terms of output, you need a heck of a big dam with a helluva lot of turbines.
A Katrina event will smash it. The very areas that are your prime candidates for such a tidal generator system, are also in the primary storm paths.

Quote:
A much better idea will be to have cheap, erosion-resistant (say, carbon-fibre or fibreglass) turbines dropped in the sea.
Objections;
1. barnacles grow on it.
2. algae grows on it.
3. plankton clogs it
4. fish clogs it.
5. bearings seize up from calcite precipitation out of sea water.

How are you going to keep ten thousand turbines CLEAN?


----------------
Sword of Damocles

A little CHAOS is a GOOD thing.
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