LA Weekly

"Pelamis is a segmented cylinder moored at both ends to the ocean floor. As a wave passes down the length of Pelamis, hinged joints on the power conversion modules allow the tubes to move up and down and side to side. The motion of the tubes relative to one another drives pumps that turn generators. The electricity flows via a cable to a shore-based grid. "

Little-known fact about last year's tsunami: If you had harnessed its energy as electricity, it would have amounted to 5 trillion watt hours -- "enough to power 5 million households for a year," according to this article in Discover magazine (subscription required, but you can register for free and buy the story for a dollar). Now engineers and energy investors from Scotland and Portugal are investing funds and hopes in a 450-foot long snake stationed five miles offshore to capture ordinary wave energy. Pelamis, as it's called, can withstand powerful storms and 60-foot waves.

One to 2 percent of the oceans' wave energy could provide 13 percent of the whole world's power. Carbon, radiation and bird-death free. Without disturbing the Cape Cod viewshed or the wintering grounds of the Wyoming muskoxen.

But there's got to be a downside. What do the whales think?

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