94 AWW.COM.AU AUGUST 2017
HAIR AND MAKE-UP BY RENATA ANGARANO.Water, water
everywhere
Kathy McInnes, 55
Our island nation is literally surrounded by
an abundant, reliable, renewable energy
resource. The ocean’s waves and tides can
both provide clean energy generation that
doesn’t stop when the sun goes down or the
wind stops blowing, says Dr Kathy McInnes,
a wave energy expert.
The senior CSIRO research scientist is
part of a team examining how to better
protect Australia’s coastline from rising
sea levels. Wave energy converters can be
part of the solution to the damage wrought
by the waves and the underlying problem
of climate change, she says.
“That’s one of the reasons I find it quite
exciting,” Dr McInnes says. “If we had arrays
of these wave energy converters extracting
energy for our uses, they’d also reduce the
impact of the waves by the time they reach
the coast. You’re actually reducing the
impact they would have on the coastline.”
The potential energy output from the ocean
surrounding Australia is about 1800 terawatt
hours. To put that in context, our country
generated 252 terawatt hours of energy in
2014-15, based on government data.
Wave and tidal energy production are still
in their infancy, but they have the potential
to be producing power as soon as 2030, Dr
McInnes says. She estimates that Australia
has the world’s most abundant source of
wave energy in the world.
“Wave energy is 24/7,” she says. “With all
these discussions around the fragility of our
energy grid, what we actually need is more
consistent energy sources.” AW W