Scientists and inventors have been trying to figure out ways to capture the energy in ocean waves for decades. There have been hundreds of patents taken out over the years. But work on wave energy took a serious turn after the oil embargo in 1972.

“Over a ten-year period from 1974 to 1983, the British government spent approximately $20 million on a national program for wave energy research and development, most of it administered by the Energy Technology Support Unit at Harwell.” (Wave Energy Technology Assessment for Grid-Connected Utility Applications, George Hagerman and Ted Heller, June 1988)

The First Symposium on Wave Energy Utilization was held in Gothenburg, Sweden in 1979. Notables such as Salter and Evans in the U.K. and McCormick in the U.S. did much of the early theoretical analysis and device design work.

“As in the United Kingdom, work in Norway on wave energy began in the mid-1970’s, and by 1985, the national government had spent approximately $12 million on research and development. In 1984, two wave power plants, having a combined capacity of 850 kWe, were built in Toftestallen, near the city of Bergen. The design and construction costs for these two demonstration plants were shared equally by the government and private industry.” (ibid)

As mentioned, Japan, India, Indonesia, Australia, and even the European Union have undertaken numerous other government-supported projects in the years since. And now Canada has just announced a demonstration project to be built in British Columbia. More important, the first commercial wave energy plant was brought online on the island of Islay, Scotland in November 2000.

But in spite of efforts on the part of a number of U.S. scientists and engineers, little federal or state funding of wave energy development has been forthcoming. In the last few years, the Navy, through its Office of Naval Research SBIR program, has provided some research funds, but the SBIR funding level is not adequate for demonstration projects.

Last revised April 9, 2002