| Energy crisis and global warming have been generally concerned by various countries in the world. In order to solve the energy problem caused by shortage of conventional fossil energy and the environmental pollution caused by carbon emission, some coastal countries have carried out a lot of researches on ocean renewable energy development and utilization. Wave energy is a most potential ocean renewable energy. Before exploitation, reliable assessment of reserves and temporal and spatial distributions of wave energy are needed which is a basic research before wave energy development and is very important for reasonable development of wave energy. The study on wave energy assessment in China is relatively later. Knowledge about the distributions of wave energy in the China Sea (especially in nearshore) is scarce and can not provide effective references for the siting selection of wave power plants and the design of wave energy convertors. View of this situation, according to the scale in descending order, wave energy are assessed for offshore large scale area and nearshore small scale area in the China Sea based on multiple datasets including altimeter data and reanalysis data. Some important references are obtained which are very meaningful for the wave energy development and utilization, the planning and siting of wave power plants and the design of wave energy convertors in China.Firstly, two calculation models for wave power density are developed which can effectively improve the accuracy of the assessment of wave power density and wave energy.Secondly, an evaluation model is established to serve the siting selection of wave power plants and the design of wave energy convertors. Selection principles of data materials for wave energy analysis are proposed; Some indexes which are related to the siting selection of wave power plants and the design of wave energy convertors are designed.Thirdly, based on recent 6 years’AVISO multi-satellites merged altimeter data and evaluation model established in this paper, theoretical wave energy in large scale area in the China Sea are analyzed in detail including abundant level, stability, total wave energy and safety. And then a division basis between theoretical wave energy and exploitable wave energy is developed. According to this basis, exploitable wave energy is assessed for the first time. This study can provide comprehensive and valuable references for the siting selection of wave power plants.At last, based on recent 20 years’ERA-Interim reanalysis wave data and evaluation model established in this paper, wave energy along offshore 50km in the China Sea are assessed totally and overall condition for wave energy in nearshore waters in the China Sea are mastered. In order to traverse nearshore areas,40 small areas are divided continuously in nearshore waters in the China Sea from which 9 dominant areas are selected and studied in detail. Some indexes which are related to the design and the operation of wave energy convertors including directionality of wave energy propagation, total wave energy distribution according to wave state, maximum wave power density, interannual variation for total wave energy and ratio of energy collecting et al. are analyzed as an emphasis. Then some meaningful and important results are obtained for the siting selection of wave power plants and the design and operation of wave energy convertors which will fill in gaps in this domain for China. The results can provide important references for practical engineering application of wave energy development and have certain practical application value for promoting wave energy development and utilization in China. |
