Harnessing Waves to Generate Power
蘇格蘭測試潮汐發電
By Mark Scott

STROMNESS, Scotland – As sailors and engineers gathered at the harbor here on the Scottish island of Mainland, Orkney, Timo Lotti was impatient to get to sea.
水手和工程師們齊集蘇格蘭梅恩蘭島上的斯特羅姆內斯港，洛提等不及要出海。

Mr. Lotti, the chief operating officer of Wello, a Finnish wave energy start-up, had just arrived from his home outside Helsinki and was eager to assess the company’s wave energy machine after months of testing under the harsh wave conditions offshore.
洛提是芬蘭海浪能源新創公司「維洛公司」的營運長，剛從他在赫爾辛基市郊的家來到斯特羅姆內斯港，該公司的浪能發電機在蘇格蘭外海經過幾個月的巨浪測試，洛提急著做個評估。

“If we don’t face surprises, we aren’t learning,” said Mr. Lotti, a native of Finland, as he directed a 15-man team responsible for towing the 30-meter-long device back to shore. (It sustained minor damage.)
洛提是芬蘭人，他邊指揮一支15人團隊把30公尺長的浪能發電機拖上岸，邊說道：「不碰到各種意外，我們就學不到東西。」（那台發電機輕微受損。）

Visits from afar are common by now in remote Orkney, population 20,000, a far-northern Scottish archipelago whose main island has been at the leading edge of wave and tidal energy research for a decade. The British, Scottish and local governments have promoted its stormy coast and rough open seas, as ideal places for testing innovations in wave and tidal energy generation a technology that analysts predict has the potential to provide as much as 15 percent of the electricity generated in the United States in the next two decades. Both start-ups and large industrial companies like Alstom of France are entering the fledgling market.
奧克尼群島偏處蘇格蘭極北，有兩萬居民，現在常見遠道而來的遊客。群島主島梅恩蘭島10年來一直走在海浪及潮汐能源研究的最前端。奧克尼群島海岸風大浪急，外海波濤洶湧，英國政府、蘇格蘭政府以及當地政府一直向外推銷這個地方，稱之為測試海浪及潮汐發電新構想的理想地點，許多分析家預測，未來20年，這種發電技術最多可提供美國總發電量的15%。許多新創公司及法國阿爾斯通這種大型工業公司都加入此一新市場。

“We’re still in the very early days, but momentum is building,” said Neil Kermode, managing director of the European Marine Energy Center, a testing site opened in Orkney in 2003. “If any country has a coastline, wave or tidal energy will be in the mix.”
「歐洲海上能源中心」是2003年在奧克尼群島設立的潮汐發電測試場，該公司總經理柯默德說：「我們還在剛起步階段，但已漸成氣候。任何國家只要靠海，浪能或潮汐能就會是他們未來的能源之一。」

With government money totaling almost $60 million, the center has installed undersea cables to testing berths off the Orkney coast to connect marine energy devices to the local electricity network; its staff has doubled in the last three years to 22.
歐洲海上能源中心總共接受政府撥給的約6000萬美元經費，在奧克尼群島沿岸鋪設海底電纜連接外海的測試平台，把海上發電設備和與當地的電力網絡連在一起；該公司員工在過去三年倍增為22人。

As the center has grown, marine energy companies, including environmental consulting firms and shipping contractors, have followed. “Marine energy is hugely important for the future of Orkney,” said Michael Morrison, business development manager at the Orkney Islands’ local government, who is helping oversee $25 million of infrastructure investment aimed at wave and tidal companies.
隨著該中心的成長，包括環境顧問公司和船運承包商在內的各種海上能源企業已應運而生。莫瑞森是奧克尼群島地方政府商業開發經理，負責監督2500萬美元基礎建設投資案的執行，這些建設是為滿足海浪及潮汐發電公司的需要。他說：「海上能源對奧克尼的前途極為重要。」

A 40-minute boat ride north of Kirkwall, Orkney’s largest town, lies the Fall of Warness, the European Marine Energy Center’s hub for tidal energy companies.
從奧克尼群島最大城鎮柯克沃爾乘船往北40分鐘，就是歐洲海上能源中心為各家潮汐能源公司所設的測試場址－渥尼斯瀑布。

It is also home to a floating machine more than 30 meters long made by made by Scotrenewables Tidal Power. The device generates energy from propellers that rotate just below the water’s surface.
「蘇格蘭再生潮汐電力公司」製造的30多公尺浮動式海上發電機也停泊在此處，發電機的螺旋槳在緊貼海平面的水下轉動發電。

The start-up was founded in Orkney in 2002 and has already signed up large industrial partners, including ABB of Switzerland and the French oil and gas company Total.
蘇格蘭再生公司2002年在奧克尼群島創立，現已與瑞士艾波比及法國道達爾石油天然氣等多家大型工業公司成為合作夥伴。

“If our technology can survive in Orkney, it can survive anywhere,” said James Murray of Scotrenewables. “Nowhere else in the world can you find so many companies testing tidal and wave devices.”
該公司經理莫瑞說：「如果我們的技術能在奧克尼群島通過測試，便可走遍天下。世界上除了奧克尼，再沒有哪個地方能找到這麼多測試潮汐及浪能發電設備的公司了。」

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/09/business/energy-environment/off-scottish-coast-harnessing-motion-of-ocean-waves.html

2013-10-22聯合報/G9版/UNITEDDAILYNEWS 馮克芸譯 原文參見紐時週報八版下