The difficulty with the energy in the oceans is that it is an energy
bank. It is the earth's (and its ecologies) starting capital, its
principal. Extracting more than is put in (minus that which comes out as
a result of natural processes) is like eating your seed corn: a really
really really dumb idea (if most of us intend to live here in this
current environment for more than a few centuries). The only real margin
we have to work with is that extra which is being retained as a result
of climatological change trends (no matter whether they are caused by
CO2 pollution or Malenkovick Cycles is irrelevant to this). This energy
comes from the sun and from deep geological processes. If you can't get
sufficient energy from solar power, then there isn't enough input to the
oceanic energy bank to compensate any withdrawals.
scerir wrote:
>
> It has been estimated that * if * less than 0.1%
> of the renewable energy available within the oceans
> *could* be converted into electricity, it would satisfy
> the present world demand for energy more than
> five times over
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1032000/1032148.stm
> http://www.wavegen.co.uk/limpet.htm
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