A New Improved Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion System With Suitable Floating Vessel Design

Abstract

Demand for energy worldwide is increasing significantly. A need for alternate energy sources has been brought to the attention of scientists and engineers. Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) is one among them which is in the development stage for the past three to four decades. Great amount of energy is available in deep-ocean with temperature difference between in upper surface-layer and in deep-ocean layer with maximum range of say up to 25 degree C in localized offshore locations near of equatorial waters. However, the technology is not in commercial operation due to the need of large capital cost. Advances in heat-exchanger material, cold-water pumps and working-fluid are the areas that research has been done extensively to make OTEC successful system. However none of that improvement in the design made OTEC technology attractive for cost effective commercialization. This paper proposes a new feasible OTEC system for about 100 MW power plants with significant change from the conventional system. The main purpose of the proposed new OTEC system is to reduce the capital cost significantly and make it commercial feasible. New types of floating vessels are proposed to support the new OTEC system to achieve cost efficiency. The floaters are very innovatively designed to support the new OTEC system. The new OTEC system with the corresponding floater significantly reduces the capital-cost of the OTEC system compared to the conventional OTEC system. Both the new OTEC system and the supporting floater system are presented herein.