Green Daily

His ideas might have sounded like fantasy in the 1920s, but the work of French scientist Georges Claude is being eyed as a possible solution to many of today's energy problems. Spring-boarding off of Claude's idea to create giant floating power stations, scientists in the near future will be able to use the ocean to generate abundant energy -- dwarfing our current efforts while still using a method that's clean and sustainable.

Using the ocean as a giant solar energy collector, these stations would harness the difference between the ocean's warm surface temperatures and cooler waters below. It works like this: warm surface waters are sucked into a vacuum where they will be boiled, powering an energy-generating turbine. Then, cold water from below is used in a condenser system that cools the steam, producing desalinated water. Perhaps the coolest feature of Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (or OTEC), is that it's entirely self-sustaining.

There are two systems that are being explored currently, the one described above, an "open system," and then there's a "closed cycle" system that uses ammonia, which boils at a lower temperature. A 250MW "open cycle" OTEC plant has won a planning permit in the UK. It's expected to turn out 300 million liters of fresh water per day.

[via Inhabitat]