Next Generation Tidal power  

Bob Morris has a post on a new development in tidal power technology - Pulse Tidal. Next-gen tidal power.

A flat, foil type device can be used to generate power in much shallower water.

Traditional designs use a rotating blade to extract energy from the moving water. The diameter of this blade is limited by the water-depth and this reduces the amount of power that can be generated in shallow water.

Pulse Tidal’s technology overcomes this limitation by using a wide, flat machine where the blade length is not limited by water depth.

At a typical site where depth is limiting a Pulse generator will extract more than 4 times as much energy as a single traditional turbine.

Being able to site in shallow water means the power generation can be much closer to shore and in calmer waters. The company says this technology can deliver low-cost, utterly reliable renewable energy, and may be able to do it for less cost than offshore wind.

Ocean Power Magazine has more. They are a great resource for everything on ocean power R&D and deployment.

Chile is actively considering several tidal energy installations as a way of filling a major gap in its future energy needs and reducing dependence on coal-fired power generation.
A feasibility study on the potential for exploiting the renewable energy resource in Chile found the country had a "unique" wealth of natural sites that, if harnessed only up to 10 percent of available tidal power, could exceed the installed capacity of Chile's central grid.

The study was conducted for the Inter-American Development Bank by Garrard Hassan energy consultancy, based in Bristol, England.

According to the report, published by Chile's National Energy Commission and reported in Energy & Oil, Latin America, Chilean tidal power sites could include the ports of San Antonio, Puerto Montt and San Vicente, the Corcovado Gulf and the Magellan Straits.

Economic prosperity has raised projections for electricity consumption in Chile, which currently averages 56 billion kilowatt hours against 802 billion kilowatt hours for all of Latin America.

Electricity generation from tidal waves is a proven technology, more predictable than solar or wind power, and already used on a commercial scale by France since 1966.

The French tidal barrage at Rance, operated by Electricite de France, produces 240 megawatts at peak time.

Uses of tidal power in mills date back to Roman times.

Tidal power generation units of varying capacity are in different stages of completion or operation in the United States, Canada, China, Russia, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand and India.

Britain is planning a tidal power barrage on the River Severn between England and Wales, but the project is currently mired in controversy. Environmentalists see its huge scale as detrimental to the local ecology. ...

Much of Chilean electricity is generated in coal-fired plants, raising fears that Chile's greenhouse gas emissions could rise with the growth in demand for electricity.

Estimates cited by the Santiago Times said that without changes to its energy matrix, Chile's coal-burning would jump to a majority stake in the country's electricity production by 2030.