Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion

Publisher Summary Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) is a means of converting into useful energy the temperature difference between surface water of the oceans in tropical and sub-tropical areas, and water at a depth of approximately 1000 m which comes from the polar regions. There is a multitude of other factors to be considered before it can be said that a particular country or location is suitable for an OTEC installation. These include distance from shore to the thermal resource, depth of the ocean bed; depth of the resource, and size of the thermal resource within the exclusive economic zone (EEZ). A contributory reason for the lack of commercialization of OTEC/DOWA to date is that the economic benefits of these products have generally still not been integrated. Technological improvements—such as the much smaller heat exchangers now required—have contributed to significantly reduced capital expenditure. Current practical OTEC activity is taking place in India and Palau, both in cooperation with Japanese technology. A further general indication of interest in DOWA, rather than OTEC alone, is provided in Japan where the industrial OTEC Association was succeeded by the Japan Association of Deep Ocean Water Applications.