The trouble with tidal turbines………. is that they need servicing and repair as often as the average car! That doesn't make them badly designed or fundamentally flawed. It does mean quite a performance though when a small thing needs fixed, like the green cable coming out of the top of this Tocardo turbine – a sensor cable that delivers valuable data on water speed, temperature etc. Indeed, while tens of thousands of politicians and activists gathered hopefully in Copenhagen last Friday, eight men in wellington boots were standing on a barge beside the Afsluitdijk. It's the dyke that stops the North Sea from flooding the Netherlands – and the two bladed tidal turbine has been spinning in one of the fast-flowing sluice channels between the freshwater IJsselmeer and the saltwater North Sea for the past 18 months. The sensor became dislodged during repairs to the sluice gates – but strange to relate, the final success of Copenhagen could rest heavily on this tiny sputnik of a machine.
The Tocardo will be one of the technologies deployed in an ambitious plan to reverse global warming, fossil fuel dependency and colossal power company profits. Two Dutchmen Hans van Breugel and Fred Gardner (that's him standing behind me in the picture) have set up a community energy company to deliver locally sourced renewable energy to 100k consumers by 2030. It's a fabulous idea and we should get onto it here -- for more, see my column in today's Scotsman www.scotsman.com and check out Equimar for new marine energy video in 2010.
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