At least 35% of Australia's current base-load power needs could be economically generated from waves, according to a report, Wave Power Assessment for the Entire Southern Coastline of Australia, published today (29th September) by the Carnegie Corporation. The independent report, commissioned by Carnegie and produced by RPS MetOcean, shows that Australia has a potential near shore (less than 25 metres water depth) wave energy resource of approximately 171,000 Megawatts, or about  four times Australia's current total installed power generation capacity.

According to the report, of this near-shore wave resource, a conservative 10% is estimated to be economically extractable. This means that around 35% of Australia's current power usage could be met by harnessing wave energy. The results also demonstrated an effective wave resource availability of 97.5% exists, making base-load (near constant) renewable power generation possible.

In a previous report, the theoretical, unconstrained deep water wave resource for the same area was estimated to be 500,000MW, reflecting more exposed open ocean conditions in water depths greater than 50 metres.

Carnegie Managing Director Dr Michael Ottaviano said:  "This report further supports Carnegie's view that Australia has the world's best wave energy resource, a resource we hope will be utilised through technologies such as CETO for base-load power generation.

 "Carnegie will use the RPS study to further inform commercial CETO site selection, which will be followed by more detailed site-specific modelling to determine the design and construction of any commercial wave energy generation site.

 "The World Energy Council estimates that the energy that could be harvested from the world's oceans is equal to twice the amount of electricity that the world currently consumes. Australia has the longest coastline with exposure to the most reliable wave energy regime in the world due to its proximity to the circumpolar Southern Ocean and the West Wind drift," said Dr Ottaviano.