| World news Europe EVOLVE Project identifies 70GW of viable ocean energy


There is 70GW of viable ocean energy waiting to be developed in Great Britain, Ireland and Portugal, according to the results from the pan-European EVOLVE project involving world-leading academics, research institutions and technology developers. The spatial modelling study focused on the three specific territories identified close to 60GW of practically viable wave energy and 10GW of tidal stream energy. More specifically, results show resources of 34.8GW in Great Britain, 18.8GW in Ireland and 15.5GW in Portugal. Projections further indicate that 10GW of ocean energy installed


in Great Britain alone could save £1.46bn per year in power system dispatch costs, with emissions reduced by up to 1.05 MtCO2. Results show a consistent pattern with increases in ocean energy


reducing overall system dispatch costs – including the cost of delivered fuel, and other variable operation and maintenance – and annual carbon emissions. These system benefits are due to the offsetting of ocean energy availability with other renewables such as wind and solar. It was found that a more diverse mix of renewables, including ocean energy, results in a more consistent renewable production profile which is better able to meet hourly electricity demands, key for reaching future international net zero targets. The rigorous two-year initiative was led by Aquatera with support


from WavEC Offshore Renewables, Research Institutes of Sweden (RISE) and The University of Edinburgh, along with wave and tidal energy developers CorPower Ocean and Orbital Marine Power. EVOLVE Technical Manager Dr Shona Pennock, who also serves as a Research Associate in Marine Energy within Edinburgh University’s Policy & Innovation Group, said: “There has been much commentary in recent years about the potential benefits of adding wave and tidal to the broader energy system, but this has been hampered by limited quantifiable studies. The EVOLVE Project aimed to directly address this point producing tangible results in terms of the costs and carbon savings associated with deploying ocean energy into future low- carbon energy mixes. “Following extensive work over a number of years we can now draw clear conclusions from firm evidence. The key headline from the EVOLVE Project is that including a higher proportion of ocean energy within our future electricity system consistently results in higher renewable dispatch, for the same total renewable energy availability, due to the offsetting of wave and tidal with wind and solar generation. The ability to dispatch more renewables also results


in lower fossil fuel and peaking plant dispatch, and thus lower total dispatch costs and carbon emissions.” Swedish wave energy developer CorPower Ocean and Scottish tidal stream energy developer Orbital Marine Power contributed significant internal ocean energy data. Analysts used these data sets to create a hypothetical generation series, calculating the potential impact of ocean energy on the overall energy system. Evidence shows that wave energy supplies higher volumes of power when wind energy dips and that tidal stream generation is completely decoupled from wind; meaning a combination of ocean and wind profiles provides greater value, rather than working in isolation. Anders Jansson, Head of Business Development at CorPower Ocean, said the EVOLVE report places further academic weight behind the case for ocean energy, helping inform decision makers across Europe. “The key challenge in the race to net-zero and 24/7 Carbon Free Energy lies in the supply of consistent and stable renewable energy,” he said. “By modelling future power system scenarios across Europe, the EVOLVE Project has been able to clearly demonstrate the role ocean energy can play in the future, ensuring a more cost-effective matching of energy supply and demand. Wave energy, in particular, has been found to correlate best to peak demand and could improve overall system security. This is particularly pertinent given the current climate and broad demand to ease reliance on gas imports.” Oliver Wragg, Commercial Director at Orbital Marine Power said:


“The net zero energy system of the future will need multiple forms of renewable energy generation. We know that the tides rise and fall like clockwork and can be predicated hundreds of years into the future. With the results of the EVOLVE project, we now also have clear projections for how the additional of predictable stable power generation from Europe’s fantastic tidal stream resource can help to cost effectively reach our net zero ambitions”. THE EVOLVE Project has received support under the framework of the OCEANERA-NET COFUND project, with funding provided by the following national/regional funding organisations: Scottish Enterprise, Swedish Energy Agency and Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia. The OCEANERA-NET COFUND project has also received funding


from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement [no.713200].


Global


Large dams face around 26% loss of storage by 2050, says new research Large dams worldwide have lost an estimated 13% to 19% of their combined original storage capacity as a result of trapped sediment, with that number set to rise to 23% to 28% by 2050, new UN research warns. The report – Present and Future Losses


of Storage in Large Reservoirs Due to Sedimentation – says that global loss from original dam capacity foreseen by mid-century – from ~6,300 billion to ~4,650 billion m3 in 2050, which roughly equals the annual water use of India, China, Indonesia, France and Canada combined. It is published by the journal Sustainability.


For the research, the United Nations


University’s Canadian-based Institute for Water, Environment and Health applied previously- determined storage loss rates in various areas worldwide to large dams in 150 countries to forecast cumulative reservoir storage losses by country, region, and globally. The UK, Panama, Ireland, Japan and


Seychelles will experience the highest water storage losses by 2050 – between 35% and 50% of their original capacities – the study shows. By contrast, Bhutan, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Guinea, and Niger will be the five least affected countries, losing less than 15% by mid-century. “The decrease in available storage by 2050 in all countries and regions will challenge many aspects of national economies, including irrigation, power generation, and water supply,”


said Dr. Duminda Perera, who co-authored the study with UNU-INWEH Director Vladimir Smakhtin and Spencer Williams of McGill University in Montreal. “The new dams under construction or planned will not offset storage losses to sedimentation. This paper sounds an alarm on a creeping global water challenge with potentially significant development implications.” The researchers applied previously-established


storage loss rates worldwide to a subset of nearly 60,000 dams in a database maintained by the International Commission on Large Dams (ICOLD). The subset comprises 47,403 large dams for which original storage capacity and year of construction are known: 28,045 in Asia-Pacific, 2,349 in Africa, 6,651 in Europe, and 10,358 in North, Central and South America. Global average annual storage losses amount


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