Estimation of Wave Power as an Energy Resource for Hawaii

by Charles L. Bretschneider, Univ of Hawaii at Manoa, United States,
R. Cengiz Ertekin, Univ of Hawaii at Manoa, United States,



Document Type: Proceeding Paper

Part of: Ocean Energy Recovery

Abstract:

One of the most important elements in determining the wave power available by means of a wave power extracting device is the amount of wave energy present at a given location during a given period of time. The objective of this work is to present different methods of wave power assessment to estimate the amount of wave energy present around the Hawaiian Islands. Four different, but closely related, methods are developed and used in conjunction with the ship-board observations of wave and wind data to calculate the wave energy flux. These methods are first explained and then applied to ship-board observed data. It is shown that estimation of wave power both from the wave data and the wind data is possible by converting the ship-board wave observations to significant height and period, and by converting wind statistics to wave power statistics. Comparison between the results of different methods shows good overall agreement.

Subject Headings: Hydro power | Wind power | Water waves | Renewable energy | Statistics | Energy methods | Electric power | Hawaii | United States

Services: Buy this book/Buy this article

 

Return to search