Riding the Waves | RenewablesBiz

Riding the Waves

A need for study

Salvatore Salamone | May 08, 2012

   

The west coast of Ireland has one of the largest concentrations of wave energy in the world. However, one potential obstacle to tapping that energy is lack of information about the environmental impact of converting wave energy into electricity. Specifically, although the European Union's marine environmental policy has established underwater noise limits, noise emissions from energy collection devices have not been assessed for environmental impact.

To address this issue, IBM and the Sustainable Energy Authority Ireland have teamed up in what the companies claim is the first project to use real-time streaming analytics for monitoring underwater noise generated by wave energy conversion devices. The goal of the project is to speed the devices' environmental impact assessment.