[Coral-List] OTEC at Guam

[Steve Coles]

There's been a lot of conjecture in these emails but very little real
informati. A 400MW OTEC was under consideration to be built on leeward Oahu
back in the early 80's and I did a submersible survey of the best
probable route down the slope off the Kahe Poewer plant. Planning and
environmental studies were done and you can find two at
https://swfsc.noaa.gov/publications/TM/SWFSC/NOAA-TM-NMFS-SWFC-68.PDF "THE
40 MW, OTEC PLANT AT KAHE POINT, OAHU, HAWAII: A CASE STUDY OF POTENTIAL
BIOLOGICAL IMPACTS, and
http://hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Environmental-Assessment-of-OTEC-in-Hawaii1.pdf
 "Environmental Assessment of Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion in Hawaii"
and lots more by Google searching the topic.

Basically, a temperature differential of 18 deg C would be sufficient
to run the system, which for Hawaiian waters would require the deep water
intake to be at  670 m where temperature is 5.3 deg. C and surface water
which averages 25.3 deg C. The amount of water required to be moved would
be huge, ca 500 cu m/sec for both intakes. The effluent mixed from both
sources would be denser than surface water, released at 60 m depth and have
little or no chance of impacting shoreline coral reefs if properly designed.

Steve Coles

<http://hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Environmental-Assessment-of-OTEC-in-Hawaii1.pdf>
<https://www.google.com/search?q=.+A+report+on+the+development+of+pilot+plant+for+ocean+thermal+energy+conversion+at+Kahe+Point,+Oahu,+Hawaii.+Hawaii+State+Dept.+of+Planning+and+Economic+Development,+Honolulu&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS739US739&sxsrf=ALeKk02GUuvRf4Uw7Dw_ZEBLqC6SZDvrTQ:1593118597227&ei=hQ_1Xo-nDa-z0PEP2uW9uAg&start=10&sa=N&ved=2ahUKEwjP_cmg7Z3qAhWvGTQIHdpyD4cQ8tMDegQICxAt&biw=980&bih=952#>

   1.
   <http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:yr8OIsFLU_QJ:hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Environmental-Assessment-of-OTEC-in-Hawaii1.pdf+&cd=15&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us>
   2.
   <https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS739US739&biw=980&bih=952&sxsrf=ALeKk02fx8OZyNjHCv3LZBg57N3QgpGErg:1593119929189&q=related:hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Environmental-Assessment-of-OTEC-in-Hawaii1.pdf+.+A+report+on+the+development+of+pilot+plant+for+ocean+thermal+energy+conversion+at+Kahe+Point,+Oahu,+Hawaii.+Hawaii+State+Dept.+of+Planning+and+Economic+Development,+Honolulu&tbo=1&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjEytqb8p3qAhWTIDQIHT2GDtY4ChAfMAR6BAgBEAc>



On Thu, Jun 25, 2020 at 2:32 AM Zink, Ian Christopher via Coral-List <
coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> wrote:

>
> Apologies if it has already been mentioned, but there has been an OTEC
> operating on the Big Island of Hawai'i for a number of years; presumably
> there would be some EIS or similar studies associated with impacts of its
> operation.
> -Ian
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Coral-List <coral-list-bounces at coral.aoml.noaa.gov> on behalf of
> Michael J. Gawel via Coral-List <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>
> Sent: Wednesday, June 24, 2020 3:12 AM
> To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov <coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov>
> Cc: Meesters, Erik <erik.meesters at wur.nl>
> Subject: [Coral-List] OTEC at Guam
>
> For  Erik Meesters request on OTEC impact studies.
> Some areas for Erik to research for references, if he hasn't yet, would be
> in the tropical Pacific OTEC research.
> The Government of Guam has studied potential OTEC development since the
> 1970's. The University of Guam Marine Lab scientists have done local
> temperature and bathymetry studies for OTEC decades ago including a 1980
> thesis by D.M. Rowley on biofouling communities at the proposed Guam OTEC
> site. Guam Power Authority has done more recent analysis on OTEC related
> potentials. I believe intake depths were calculated for maybe 1,200 feet
> depth and any piping would have to cross reefs with high coral diversity.
> The discharge from OTEC facilities apparently would have to be very deep
> to avoid impacts to reef life. Directional drilling has been used for
> sewer outfalls on Guam to avoid impacts on reef habitats and probably
> would be applied for OTEC piping.
> OTEC studies at Hainan and Taiwan may have considered coral reef impacts
> and the 1980's Japanese trial on Nauru of OTEC technology crossed coral
> reefs for intake and may have had impact studies. Sorry I haven't been
> able to search references for these.
>
> Mike Gawel
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Coral-List mailing list
> Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>
> https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcoral.aoml.noaa.gov%2Fmailman%2Flistinfo%2Fcoral-list&data=02%7C01%7Cizink%40rsmas.miami.edu%7Ca47f1a16f8cd4e3a022c08d8183b4b82%7C2a144b72f23942d48c0e6f0f17c48e33%7C0%7C0%7C637285990240954245&sdata=ZnGpAmVNo9ozNg4%2Fmd8GKYyArRKcUKJVGjLFK6NVxNM%3D&reserved=0
> _______________________________________________
> Coral-List mailing list
> Coral-List at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
> https://coral.aoml.noaa.gov/mailman/listinfo/coral-list
>