By TIM FAULKNER/ecoRI.org
News staff
WARWICK — The
renewable energy conference canceled by Hurricane Sandy in October returned
this week to help prevent future climate change-induced storms.
The Jan. 10 Marine
Renewable Energy Technical Conference at the Crowne Plaza reached an audience
of scientists immersed in the emerging research of wave energy, offshore wind
power and underwater tidal energy.
The technology is
still deep in the research stage. Many of the devises and date discussed at the
conference focused on methods for measuring the sizable energy from oceans and
rivers. Federal grants have supported this research, helping broaden programs
at the University of Rhode Island, University of New Hampshire and the
University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth.
John Miller, the
director of the conference, said wave and tidal technology is getting closer to
commercial applications. As a renewable energy, offshore wind and wave energy
can provide a constant energy supply that solar and onshore wind lack, he said.
The Northeast doesn’t have the same wave force as other regions, he added, but
there is still energy to harness.
Offshore areas that
are closed to fishing would be well suited for this technology. “We just have
to develop technologies that work here,” Miller said.
Sen. Sheldon
Whitehouse, D-R.I., opened the conference by speaking of the “grave anxiety”
from scientists about unprecedented levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
and increasing ocean acidity. The damage to ocean reefs around the world has
been devastating, he said. Carbon emissions, the main contributor to climate
change, recently registered above 400 parts per million in the Arctic,
Whitehouse noted.
“The work you are
doing here is very important,” he said. “The stakes are very, very high.”