![]() ![]() At the time, the department was spending around £200 million on nuclear research. The department, which was packed with nuclear supporters, had instructed ACORD to reduce its renewables research budget from £14 million £11 million. Soon after this, the department's research and development advisory council (ACORD) met, excluding Grove-Palmer, and accepted a secret report, prepared by a unit based at British Atomic Energy Authority headquarters, claiming that wind power had more immediate commercial possibilities than wave power, and research funds should be shifted to it. Clive Grove-Palmer, a respected department engineer seconded to work on the duck project, estimated that the cost could be got down around 3 pence per kilowatt-hour (about 7 cents). In 1982, a consultant was able to report that the duck could be expected, with further development, to produce electricity at a cost of around 5.5 pence (about 12 cents) per kilowatt-hour, a price competitive with nuclear power (the most expensive commercial generation process in use in Britain). This was one of several research groups set up after a 1976 judgment by the Department of Energy that wave power was the most promising renewable energy source. It was developed in the late '70s by a team headed by Professor Stephen Salter at Edinburgh University. The Duck is a 300-tonne floating canister designed to drive a generator from the motion of bobbing up and down on waves like a duck. The case of Salter's Duck is illuminating. And they must do so against heavy odds, such as scant funding and even sabotage. ![]() While hydro and biomass are long-established, if under-used, parts of the power hierarchy, wind, solar and wave power must still battle to establish themselves. Traditional energy generators have generally not assisted the necessary moves towards renewable technology. ![]()
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