Growth of ocean thermal energy conversion resources under greenhouse warming regulated by oceanic eddies

Tianshi Du, Zhao Jing (), Lixin Wu, Hong Wang, Zhaohui Chen, Xiaohui Ma, Bolan Gan and Haiyuan Yang
Additional contact information
Tianshi Du: Ocean University of China
Zhao Jing: Ocean University of China
Lixin Wu: Ocean University of China
Hong Wang: Ocean University of China
Zhaohui Chen: Ocean University of China
Xiaohui Ma: Ocean University of China
Bolan Gan: Ocean University of China
Haiyuan Yang: Ocean University of China

Nature Communications, 2022, vol. 13, issue 1, 1-9

Abstract: Abstract The concept of utilizing a large temperature difference (>20 °C) between the surface and deep seawater to generate electricity, known as the ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC), provides a renewable solution to fueling our future. However, it remains poorly assessed how the OTEC resources will respond to future climate change. Here, we find that the global OTEC power potential is projected to increase by 46% around the end of this century under a high carbon emission scenario, compared to its present-day level. The augmented OTEC power potential due to the rising sea surface temperature is partially offset by the deep ocean warming. The offsetting effect is more evident in the Atlantic Ocean than Pacific and Indian Oceans. This is mainly attributed to the weakening of mesoscale eddy-induced upward heat transport, suggesting an important role of mesoscale eddies in regulating the response of thermal stratification and OTEC power potential to greenhouse warming.

Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-34835-z Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-34835-z

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-34835-z

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().