According to a Guardian article this week 'Paris looks for power beneath the Seine' Paris city hall is launching a project asking companies to propose tidal turbine designs to go under the Seine, writes Carol Miers.
Interested companies have until the Autumn to submit their proposal. The winner will be selected in January and the first rotor could be installed in summer 2011.
In fact, Paris has a climate plan and the Deputy mayor, Denis Baupin, is the sustainability officer.
His innovative ideas also include handing out free, energy-efficient light bulbs, heating schools with sewage pipes, and introducing the electric car.
Baupin stressed that it's important to make Parisians aware of the need to watch what they consume.
All well and good, but what about the reality of turbines in the Seine?
"Well you have to ask yourself 'what kind of awareness are they trying to raise?'" said
Peter Fraenkel, Technical Director, of Marine Current Turbines. "It does sound a little bit insane."
He continued, “Let me just explain my cynicism. The Seine is probably not much deeper than the Thames, probably narrower and smaller, being in the middle of Paris so I would guess it is 3 or 4m deep that it probably doesn't move very fast so the output they are going to generate will be extremely minor probably 2 or 3 KW, just enough to boil an electric kettle," said Peter Fraenkel.
"They are going to spend quite a lot of money to prove that moving water has energy in it which can be extracted in small quantities, when it's quite well known anyway."
Mr Fraenkel works for Marine Current Turbines, which has the world's first commercial tidal turbine power generator in Strangford Lough, Northern Ireland.
“Our one in Strangford Narrows is in 25m depth of water and moving at speeds of up to nearly 10 knots so no comparison with the Seine.
"The sea compared to a small river through a city is the difference between a teaspoon and a bathtub," he said.
"These are well meaning people who will probably send out the wrong message - I'd be very surprised if it actually happens," he said.
There are other much more significant projects bobbing about. There are calls for designs for tidal turbines just now in process.
"The Crown estate is concentrating on generating 1,200MW from sea space," said Peter Fraenkal.
Half of it for wave energy and half for tidal, taking in proposals for the Orkneys, Pentland Firth. Four companies have been asked to submit detailed tenders for the waters around the Orkneys.
"We are the only ones who have got anything up and running of this size and we are not ready to go to the Pentland Firth," he said.
While the river to the sea is like a teaspoon to a bath of water, the water around the Orkneys according to Mr Fraenkel is 'a wild stretch of water where you have a width of 30km, it's 60m deep, and you get huge speeds'.
Over the next few years, European minds will be solving the problems of how to take energy from this sea torrent, but as yet, he says 'the technology to exploit it doesn't quite exist'.
Related; Tidal power on test in Orkney
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