A Dehydrated Energy Market?

Okay, so we’ve covered two of the earth’s four classical elements. Up next: Water! We can harness several types of energy from water:

• Hydroelectric Power involves harnessing energy from the movement of water in different water masses
• Tidal Power is created by moving tides, which drive turbines to generate electricity
• Waves compress trapped air, creating wave power, which drives turbines to generate electricity

As there are so many different types of energy generated from water, and the tides are always readily available, we seem to have no trouble accessing it. In fact, hydroelectric and tidal power, are the most efficient methods of large-scale electric power generation as shown below:

Hydroelectric power is also extremely cheap at 8 cents per kWh (US Energy Information Administration, 2015)! The hydroelectric power market is growing though. The graph below shows additional TWh of electricity generation produced by Hydropower since 2005 International Energy Office:

As you can see, before 2005, in 6 years, hydropower electricity generation increased by 600TWh, which shows increasing investment into such an efficient energy source. This final graph (IEA, 2011) shows the untapped potential of hydropower in various different regions:

Since hydropower is one of the cheapest and most efficient energy sources, and there is so much untapped potential, it is entirely possible that it has a lot to offer in the battle against climate change. However, to see this untapped potential materialise into a significant contribution in repairing the Earth (if we can), the market needs substantial investment and global implementations.