Future Renewable Power Generation Technologies: The future costs, impact and growth of green energy

Table of Contents

Executive Summary

• Introduction
• Hydropower
• Wind power
• Biomass
• Solar power
• Marine power generation technologies
• Political and legislative issues
• The prospects for renewable technologies

Chapter 1 An introduction to key renewable technologies

• Energy crises - a brief history
• The economics of renewables
• Subsidies and legislation
• Renewable technologies
• The report structure

Chapter 2 Hydropower

• Introduction
• Hydropower resources
• Hydropower sites and project types
• Project viability and feasibility studies
  • Civil engineering
  • Electrical engineering
• Small hydropower considerations
• Environmental Considerations
• The cost of hydropower
• The prospects for hydropower

Chapter 3 Wind power

• Installed capacity and the wind resource
• Wind energy sites
• Wind turbine technology
• Turbine size
• Turbine developments
• Offshore considerations
• Wind farms
• Grid considerations
• Energy storage
• The environmental effects of wind power
• The cost of wind power
• The prospects for wind power

Chapter 4 Biomass

• The biomass resource
• Energy crops
• Biomass fuels
• Biomass combustion technology
• Co-firing
• Biomass gasification
• Anaerobic digestion
• Environmental considerations
• Fuel issues
• The cost of biomass power generation
• The prospects for biomass power generation

Chapter 5 Solar power

• The solar resource
• Solar power technology
• Solar photovoltaic power generation
  • Solar cell technology
  • Solar cell materials
  • Solar cell production
  • Solar panels
  • Solar concentrators
• Solar cell environmental issues
• Solar thermal power generation
  • Solar Towers
  • Solar Parabolic Collectors
  • Solar dish collectors
• Environmental effects of solar thermal power plants
• The cost of solar power generation
• The prospects for solar power generation

Chapter 6 Marine power generation technologies

• Tidal energy
• Tidal technology
• Turbines
• The environmental effects of tidal power
• The economics of tidal power generation
• Prospects for tidal generation
• Ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC)
• OTEC technology
• Browsing OTEC
• Environmental effects of OTEC
• The cost of OTEC
• OTEC prospects
• Ocean (tidal) stream power generation
• Ocean stream technology
• Environmental effects of ocean stream technology
• The cost of ocean stream generation
• The prospects for ocean stream technology
• Wave energy
• Wave energy capture technology
• Shore-based wave devices
• Offshore wave devices
• Environmental effects of wave energy converters
• The cost of wave energy
• The potential for wave energy conversion

Chapter 7 Political and legislative issues

• Renewable energy targets
• Subsidies
• Externalities
• Green trading schemes and carbon taxes
• The EU Emission Trading Scheme
• Renewable obligations
• The future

Chapter 8 The prospects for renewable technologies

• Capital costs
• Generating costs
• Capacity growth
• Conclusions

Chapter 9 Renewable energy executive survey 2006

• Introduction
• Glossary