Technology Progress In Ocean Thermal Energy

Significant progress has been achieved in the ocean temperature difference power generation in the field of circulation process, heat exchanger, working medium and ocean engineering technology. From the viewpoint of techniques, there is no any difficulty, which cannot be tackled, and the major of the technology has tended to be ripe. But it still exists the problems on the economic benefits and reliability for long-term operation. The heat exchanger is the critical part in the temperature difference power generation, which covers 50%-20% in the total investment and directly impact on the structure of the device and its economic benefits. To increase the performance of heat exchanger lies in the type and material of exchanger. The research results show that titanium will be the preferred material, which is good at its heat transfer and anticorrosion. The plate heat exchanger is suitable for the application in closed circulation system because of its compact volume, high efficiency in heat transfer and low cost.

Working medium is also the important task in the research of closed circulation system. From the viewpoint of performance, ammonia and R22 are demonstrated as the ideal working medium. But from the viewpoint of environment concerns, new working medium is still requested to look for.

Regarding the marine engineering technology, research on cool water pipe, mooring and power distribution has been conducted, in particular the laying technology of cool water pipe, for which experiment on multi connection type was conducted and results has achieved.