Benchmarking
As we mentioned previously, LCOE's are quite useful for comparison.
We
think that the biggest competitor with wave energy is offshore wind, as they operate in the same environment and so have analogous installation and O&M
procedures, etc. However, while offshore wind is becoming more popular and a viable
energy, wave energy is still left a bit to a side.
From the World Energy Council report: Costs of Energy Technologies 2013, we can see that the LCOE's of wave energy (0.38€/kWh) nearly double the ones for offshore wind (0.20€/kWh). We also checked the values we obtained from our theoretical modelling (15 years lifetime for the device and 12% discount rate) using the best site (North Uist), and doing the average for both devices, achieving 0.395€/kWh, which is not so far away from the stated 0.38€/kWh for wave energy. The following graph shows the comparison between the three different LCOE's.
From the World Energy Council report: Costs of Energy Technologies 2013, we can see that the LCOE's of wave energy (0.38€/kWh) nearly double the ones for offshore wind (0.20€/kWh). We also checked the values we obtained from our theoretical modelling (15 years lifetime for the device and 12% discount rate) using the best site (North Uist), and doing the average for both devices, achieving 0.395€/kWh, which is not so far away from the stated 0.38€/kWh for wave energy. The following graph shows the comparison between the three different LCOE's.
Source: World Energy Council (Costs of Energy Technologies 2013)
|
Chart to show different LCOE studied
|