Ocean Project Set for Hawaii Tests

This article, Wave Generated Electricity Tests Set , Bruce Dunford, Star Bulletin (8/4/03) gives an update on the status of Ocean Power Technologies pilot ocean energy project at a Marine Corps base in Hawaii. As the article describes:

Ocean Power Technologies holds a $9.5 million contract from the Office of Naval Research to test if the bobbing of subsurface buoys tethered to the ocean floor can efficiently generate electricity for Marine Corps Base Hawaii-Kaneohe. The pilot project's first phase calls for one of the company's trademarked PowerBuoys to be given a buoyancy to ride nine to 12 feet below the surface in 100 feet of water nearly a mile off the Kaneohe base's Hilltop housing area. As the swell passes, the 40-foot-long, 15-foot-diameter, vertically positioned PowerBuoy moves up and down on a rigid pole anchored to the bottom. The up-and-down movement mechanically creates a flow of hydraulic fluid to drive an electrical generator housed in a canister on the ocean floor, said Don Rochon, spokesman for the Pacific Division of the Naval Facilities Engineering Command, which is overseeing the project.

The Ocean Technologies project is one of just a few wave energy projects to reach the pilot stage in the United States, the other being the
AquaEnergy Group's proposed Makah Bay project off the coast of Washington state.