Module-4 :

TIDAL POWER &

Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion:
Syllabus:
Tidal Power: Tides and waves as energy suppliers and their mechanics;
fundamental characteristics of tidal power, harnessing tidal energy, advantages
and limitations.
Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion: Principle of working, OTEC power
stations in the world, problems associated with OTEC.

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 Ocean energy sources – General Aspects
Ocean energy sources may be broadly divided into the
following four categories :
1) Tidal energy
2) Wave energy
3) Ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC)
4) Energy originated from the sun-ocean system from the
mechanism of surface water evaporation by solar
heating i.e. hydrological cycle.
Tidal energy is a form of power produced by the
natural rise and fall of tides caused by the gravitational
interaction between Earth, the sun, and the moon.
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 TIDAL POWER PLANTS
The periodic rise and fall of the water level of sea which are carried by the
action of the sun and moon on water of the earth is called the ‘tide’
 Tidal energy can furnish a significant portion of all such energies which are renewable

in nature.

 The large scale up and down movement of sea water represents an unlimited source of

energy.

 If some part of this vast energy can be converted into electrical energy, it would be an

important source of hydropower.

 The main feature of the tidal cycle is the difference in water surface elevations at the

high tide and at the low tide.

 If this differential head could be utilized in operating a hydraulic turbine, the tidal

energy could be converted into electrical energy by means of an attached generator.

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 Tidal Power
When a basin exists along the shores with high tides, the power in the tide can be hydro-
electrically utilized. This can be realized by having a long dam across the basin and locating two
sets of turbines underneath the dam. As the tide comes in, water flows into the basin operating
one set of turbines. At low tide the water flows out of the basin operating another set of turbines.

Let, h= Tidal range from high to low (in m), and

A = Area of water stored in the basin (in m3)

1
Then energy stored in the full basin is given as :
ℎ
𝐸= 𝜌𝑔𝐴 න 𝑥.𝑑𝑥 𝑂𝑅 𝐸= 𝜌𝑔ℎ2𝐴
0 2
𝜌𝑔ℎ2𝐴 𝜌𝑔ℎ2
1

𝐴𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑔𝑒 𝑃𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟, 𝑃𝑎𝑣 = 2 =

𝑇ൗ 𝐴ൗ
2 𝑇

Where, T = Period of tidal cycle = 14 h 44 min, usually.

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 Tidal Power Stations
Following are a few places which have been surveyed in the world as sites for tidal
power :
1) San Jose (South America) : 10.7 m, 777 km2, 19,900 MW
2) Sever (UK) : 9.8 m, 70 km2, 8,000 MW
3) Passanaquoddy Bay (North America) : 5.5 m, 262 km2 , 1,800 MW

In India, following are the major sites where preliminary investigations have been
carried out :
4) Bhavanagar
5) Navalakh (Kutch)
6) Diamond harbor
7) Ganga Sagar

The basin in Kandla in Gujarat has been estimated to have a capacity of 600 MW.
The total potential of Indian coast is around 9000 MW, which does not compare
favourably with the sites in the American continent stated above. The technical and economic
difficulties still prevail.
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 Components of Tidal Power Plants
The following are the components of a tidal
power plant :
1) The dam or dyke (low wall) to form the pool or
basin.
2) Sluice ways from the basins to the sea and vice
versa.
3) The power house.
• Dam or Dyke : The function of dam or dyke is to
form a barrier between the sea and the basin or
between one basin and the other in case of
multiple basins.
• Sluice ways : These are used to fill the basin
during the high tide or empty the basin during
the low tide, as per operational requirement.
These devices are controlled through gates.
• Power house : A power house has turbines,
electric generators and other auxiliary
equipment. As far as possible the power house
and sluice ways should be in alignment with the
dam or dyke.
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 Classification and Operation of Tidal Power Plants

Tidal power plants are classified as follows :

I. Single basin arrangement
a) Single ebb-cycle system
b) Single tide-cycle system
c) Double cycle system
II. Double basin arrangement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYCRO-yfRv
c

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 Single Basin Tidal Power Plant

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The arrangement of this system is shown in figure.
•The ocean tides rise and fall and water can be stored during the rise
period and it can be discharged during fall.
•A dam is constructed separating the tidal basin from the sea and a
difference in water level is obtained between the basin and sea.
•During high tide period, water flows from the sea into the tidal basin
through the water turbine.
•The height of tide is above that of tidal basin. Hence the turbine unit
operates and generates power, as it is directly coupled to a generator.
•During low tide period, water flows from tidal basin to sea, as the water
level in the basin is more than that of the tide in the sea.
•During this period also, the flowing water rotates the turbine and
generator
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 Double Basin Tidal Power Plant

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•There are two basins at different levels. A dam is provided between two basins. The
turbines are located in the dam.
•The sluice gates are provided in the dam. One basin is called the upper basin; the water
level is maintained above that in the other, the low basin.
•The high level basin gates are called the inlet gates and low level gates as outlet gates.
The upper basin is filled with water.
•When the water level in upper basin A provides a sufficient difference of head between
the two basins, the turbines are started.
•The water flows from basin A to basin B through the turbines and the power is
generated.
•The power generation thus continues simultaneously along with filling up of water in
basin A.
•When the tide attains its peak value, the water level in basin A is maximum; the inlet
sluices are then closed. The water flows from the upper basin to the lower basin through
the turbines.
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 Advantages and Limitations of Tidal Power Generation
Advantages :
1) Tidal power is completely independent of the precipitation (rain) and its
uncertainty, besides being inexhaustible.
2) Large area of valuable land is not required.
3) When tidal power plant works in combination with thermal or hydro-
electric system peak power demand can be effectively met with.
4) Tidal power generation is free from pollution.
Limitations :
5) Due to variation in tidal range the output is not uniform.
6) Since the turbines have to work on a wide range of head variation the plant
efficiency is affected.
7) There is a fear of machinery being corroded due to corrosive sea water.
8) It is difficult to carry out construction in sea.
9) As compared to other sources of energy, the tidal power plant is costly.
10) Sedimentation and siltation of basins are the problems associated with
tidal power plants.
11) The power transmission cost is high because the tidal power plants are
located away from load centres.
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 OCEAN THERMAL ENERGY CONVERSION
WAVE ENERGY
•Wave energy comes from the interaction between the winds and the surfaces of
oceans.
•The energy available varies with the size and frequency of waves.
•It is estimated that about 10 kW of power is available for every metre width of the
wave front.
•Wave energy when active is very concentrated, therefore, wave energy conversion
into useful energy can be carried out at high power densities.
•A large variety of devices (e.g. hydraulic accumulator wave machine ; high-level
reservoir machine ; Dolphin-type wave-power machine ; Dam-Atoll wave machine)
have been developed for harvesting of energy but these are complicated and fragile
in face of gigantic power of ocean storms.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8miWW2QyN_4
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 Advantages and Disadvantages
Advantages :
• It is relatively pollution free.
• It is a free and renewable energy source.
• After removal of power, the waves are in pleasant state.
• Wave-power devices do not require large land masses.
• Whenever there is a large wave activity, a string of devices have to be
used. The system not only produces electricity but also protects coast lines
from the destructive action of large waves, minimizes erosion and help to
create artificial harbor.
Disadvantages :
• Lack of dependability.
• Relative scarcity of accessible sites of large wave activity.
• The construction of conversion devices is relatively complicated.
• The devices have to withstand enormous power of stormy seas.
• There are un favourbale economic factors such as large capital investment
and costs of repair, replacement and maintenance.
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 Problems associated with wave energy collection
The collection of wave energy entails the following problems :
• The variation of frequency and amplitude makes it an unsteady source.
• Devices, installed to collect and to transfer wave energy from far off
oceans, will have to with stand advantage weather conditions.
• Until now no major development programme for wave energy has been
carried but successfully through any country.
• Small devices are available, however, and are in limited use as power
supplies for buoys and navigational aids.
• From the engineering development point of view, wave energy
development is not nearly as far long as wind and tidal energy.
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 Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) Plant
• The oceans cover about 70% of the global surface and are
particularly extensive in the tropical zones.
• Therefore, most of the sun’s radiations is absorbed by sea water.
Thus warm water on the ocean’s surface flows from the tropics
towards poles.
• Cold water circulates at the ocean bottom from the poles to the
tropics. Hence, in the tropical regions the water temperature is
around 5 C at a depth of 1000m, whereas at the surface, it remains
almost constant at 25 C (for the first few meters because of mixing)
subsequently it decreases and asymptotically approaches the value
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the lower level). Renewable Energy Engineering 17
• Thus, we can employ a Carnot-type process to generate power
between these two steady temperatures. Such plants are called
Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion Plants
• All the systems being proposed for construction, now work on a
‘Closed Rankine cycle’ and use low boiling point working fluids
like ammonia, propane, R-12, R-22 etc.
• These systems would be located off shore on large floating
platforms or inside floating hulls. The warm surface water is
used for supplying the heat input in the boiler, while the cold
water brought up from the ocean depths is used for extracting
the heat in the condenser.
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 Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) Plant

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 OTEC power stations in the world

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 Merits and Limitations of OTEC Plant
Merits :
1) It is clean form of energy conversion.
2) It does not occupy land areas.
3) No payment for the energy required.
4) It can be steady source of energy since the temperatures are almost steady.
Limitations :
5) About 30 percent of the power generated would be used to pump water.
6) The system would have to withstand strong convective effect of sea water;
hurricanes and presence of debris and fish contribute additional hazard.
7) The materials used will have to withstand the highly corrosive atmosphere
and working fluid.
8) Construction of floating power plants is difficult.
9) Plant size is limited to about 100 MW due to large size of components.
10) Very heavy investment is required.

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 Non-Conventional energy sources

GEOTHERMAL
POWER PLANTS

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 GEOTHERMAL POWER PLANTS
As we travel down earth’s radially, there exists a temperature
gradient of 0.03 per metre. Thus a 30 increase in temperature can be
obtained per kilometer depth from the earth’s crust. There are many local
hot spots just below the surface where the temperatures are much higher
than expected. Ground water, when comes into contact with these hot
spots, either dry or wet steam is formed. By drilling holes to these
locations, hot water and steam can be tapped and these can be used for
power generation or space heating.
It is known from many years that the core of the earth is considerably hot
(220℃-250℃). It has also been found that the earth contains large reservoirs of
steam which are created due to the absorption of core heat by the percolating
water during the rains. This naturally available steam can be directly used in the
steam power plant.

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 Types of Geo Plants
The geothermal sources are generally
subdivided into three groups as
1) Vapour Dominated or Dry Steam Field
2) Liquid Dominated Field
3) Hot Water Fields

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 1) Vapour Dominated or Dry Steam Field

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 Dry-Steam open system

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 1) Vapour Dominated or Dry Steam Field
In this system storage is directly used for
power generation. In this system, hot dry steam is
taken out through a pipe and a valve and passed
through a separator where most of the debris are
removed and dry-steam is collected in the drum.
Then the steam is passed to the turbine, then
condenser and the condensate is re-injected into
the ground when can be used by the ground to
absorb the rock heat again and generates the steam.
This system is used at Larderello (540 MW) in
Italy and Greyser in USA.

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 2) Liquid Dominated Field

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 Flash steam open type system

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 2) Liquid Dominated Field
• In this case, the ground storage contains large quantities of hot water at a
considerable high-temperature (180-200 deg celcius) therefore, it is
maintained at a considerably high temperature. If this water is flashed at a
lower pressure, then part of the water is converted into steam at a lower
pressure and the same steam can be used for power generation.
• The arrangement of such system is shown in the figure. The hot water at a
higher pressure is taken out through a pipe and control valve and passed
through a flash chamber where low pressure steam is generated.
• This low pressure steam is passed through the turbine, condenser and
then injected to the ground through the pump. The water collected in the
flash chamber is also injected back as shown in the figure.
• The only difference between this and earlier plant is, the steam is available
at a considerably lower pressure so the plant efficiency is also low.
• This system is used at Cerro-Prierol plant in Mexico and Octake plant in
Japan.

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 3) Hot Water Fields

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 Hot water closed (Binary) system

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 3) Hot Water Fields
• In this system, the heat carried with the hot water is used
in the heat exchanger to generate the steam at a
considerably lower pressure and the generated steam is
supplied to the turbine and the exhaust steam from
turbine is condensed in the condenser and the
condensate is again recirculated through the heat
exchanger with the help of a pump.
• This system works on closed Rankine cycle. Its thermal
efficiency is much lower compared with other two
systems. These systems are under-development in USA
and earlier USSR. It is estimated that geothermal energy
presently available is 8x1018 kJ at 3 km depth and 4x1019
kJ at a depth of 10 km.
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 Advantages and Disadvantages of Geothermal energy

Advantages :
1) It is cheaper as steam is directly available without
using any fuel.
2) It is least polluting compared with conventional
thermal plants.
3) It can also be used (for heating and processing) in
addition to power generation.
4) It provides highest load factor (0.55 to 0.9) compared
to conventional thermal plant (0.4 to 0.5).
5) As the hot rock energy is extremely large, so this
energy is considered as inexhaustible. The power
plant of 540 MW in Italy is running for 100 years.
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 Advantages and Disadvantages of Geothermal energy

Disadvantages :
1) The drilling operation is very costly.
2) Very large storage areas (106 to 107 m2) are required.
3) The withdrawal of large amount of steam from
underground may result in surface subsidence or
settlement.
4) The thermal efficiency of such power plants is
considerably low (12 to 15%) compared with
conventional thermal system (40 to 45%).
5) The thermal efficiency also decreases with respect to
time as the pressure of steam available falls.
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 Geo Power Plants
These systems are under-development in USA and
earlier USSR. It is estimated that geothermal energy
presently available is 8x1018 kJ at 3 km depth and 4x1019
kJ at a depth of 10 km. The geothermal energy is
available in a few parts of world only and it can be used
only where it is available.
As India is concerned, Puga valley, 4500 meters
above sea level in Ladakh is considered most promising
region for geothermal power. It is estimated that nearly
20 tons of dry steam/hr is available which will be
sufficient to generate 5 MW of power.
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