Restless Energy
131
of winds, waves and currents are any the less important in modern
times: the re—routing of tankers and other“ commercial vessels to
avoid adverse conditions out at sea can still save money, time and
lives. The difference is that advances in obtaining, transmitting and
processing relevant observations promise to replace a passive
treatment of information accumulated over long periods, by active
forecasting on a day—to—day basis, with oceanic buoys sending data
via satellites and shore stations to meteorological centres.
The inuence of the elements is not restricted to the distant
oceans; on the shore, energy collected from winds blowing far away
is being continually dissipated in surf and breaking waves. Typically,
the ocean swell, as it arrives at the shore, releases something like
‘
40 kilowatts of energy (the power of a family car) per yard of coast—
line. ln some parts of the world, the release of energy at the water’s
edge assumes a much more dramatic and dangerous guise when,
from time to time, huge crests of water rise many feet into the air to
deliver a destructive force inherited miles away from some violent
disruption of the ocean oor. More frequently, the coasts are
subject to prolonged and powerful pounding from waves lashed
into a fury by gale—force winds. Superimposed upon all this frantic
activity comes the more regular pattern of the ebb and ow of the
tides. Sometimes waves, wind and tide combine with disastrous
results, as in january 19 5 3 when serious ooding in eastern England
and the Netherlands caused extensive damage to property and
resulted in the death of 2,107 people.
Fortunately, the oceans do not always expend their energy in such
aimless and destructive ways. French engineers, for example, have
built a tidal power station which diverts some of it to man’s use.
Every day the tides turn generators set into the dam of the tidal
power station, feeding eleqtricity into the national power grid. Sites
suitable for tidal power stations exist elsewhere but more immediate
attention is likely to be devoted to the disruptive elements of ocean
energy than its benecial ones. In this sense, it may seem something
of a ‘negative’ resource. Nevertheless, intimately involved in all this
activity is the important work of distributing the energy arriving
from the Sun (as well as heat from the Earth’s mantle) and in this
way maintaining the largely equable climate of the entire world.
Waves in action
Early on the morning of March 28, 1946, waves over fty feet
131
of winds, waves and currents are any the less important in modern
times: the re—routing of tankers and other“ commercial vessels to
avoid adverse conditions out at sea can still save money, time and
lives. The difference is that advances in obtaining, transmitting and
processing relevant observations promise to replace a passive
treatment of information accumulated over long periods, by active
forecasting on a day—to—day basis, with oceanic buoys sending data
via satellites and shore stations to meteorological centres.
The inuence of the elements is not restricted to the distant
oceans; on the shore, energy collected from winds blowing far away
is being continually dissipated in surf and breaking waves. Typically,
the ocean swell, as it arrives at the shore, releases something like
‘
40 kilowatts of energy (the power of a family car) per yard of coast—
line. ln some parts of the world, the release of energy at the water’s
edge assumes a much more dramatic and dangerous guise when,
from time to time, huge crests of water rise many feet into the air to
deliver a destructive force inherited miles away from some violent
disruption of the ocean oor. More frequently, the coasts are
subject to prolonged and powerful pounding from waves lashed
into a fury by gale—force winds. Superimposed upon all this frantic
activity comes the more regular pattern of the ebb and ow of the
tides. Sometimes waves, wind and tide combine with disastrous
results, as in january 19 5 3 when serious ooding in eastern England
and the Netherlands caused extensive damage to property and
resulted in the death of 2,107 people.
Fortunately, the oceans do not always expend their energy in such
aimless and destructive ways. French engineers, for example, have
built a tidal power station which diverts some of it to man’s use.
Every day the tides turn generators set into the dam of the tidal
power station, feeding eleqtricity into the national power grid. Sites
suitable for tidal power stations exist elsewhere but more immediate
attention is likely to be devoted to the disruptive elements of ocean
energy than its benecial ones. In this sense, it may seem something
of a ‘negative’ resource. Nevertheless, intimately involved in all this
activity is the important work of distributing the energy arriving
from the Sun (as well as heat from the Earth’s mantle) and in this
way maintaining the largely equable climate of the entire world.
Waves in action
Early on the morning of March 28, 1946, waves over fty feet