Wave buoy power plant system - #MakeItFloat

thingiverse

This is a radical idea for an affordable and sustainable power plant anchored in the open ocean where waves are constantly present. ## Principle The three satellites form a tripod system that oscillates against the central body as waves move through the arrangement. The central body is guided passively by the linkage to roll into a position where the piston can freely oscillate within the hydraulic cylinder. The forces involved are relatively small. A Pelton or Francis turbine placed inside the central body (where there's ample space for various equipment) will convert hydraulic pressure into electrical energy. ## Energy Harvest To give you an idea of the amount of energy this system can produce with a main body radius of, say, 10 meters: 1. A radius of 10 meters gives the center ball a volume of 4200 cubic meters while the satellites have a radius of 7 meters. So, the total mass of all four bodies will be 4200 tons. 2. If waves oscillate the satellite masses against the central mass at an amplitude of only 2 meters with a half-period of 2.5 seconds (wave period of 5 seconds), the piston will produce a hydraulic power of 33 megawatts. 3. Say, we can harvest half of it as electric power - isn't that impressive? 4. The system will be able to withstand massive waves up to 20 meters high. For bigger waves like tsunamis, it will have to flood its air chambers with water to increase its density above 1 and dive to the sea floor. ## Better Think Big Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to generate energy with a printed 3D model of say R = 5cm at an amplitude of 5cm. My calculation routine shows that at a period of 1 second, the hydraulic energy will be 0.5 watts - which might not even be enough to create a small fountain on top of the piston linkage unless everything is fabricated with high precision. ## Code Better scale up the design as a whole. I didn't take much care in parametrizing everything, but I included many comments to guide you through the straightforward code. For faster coding, I used my library [shortcuts.scad](http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:644830). Sorry about that - it's just so convenient...