Subscribe now   Home |Tech |Environment | News  Green machine: A
salty solution for power generation   We've already tried to
generate power from ocean waves and tides. Now engineers are
trying to tap energy from another of the sea's abundant
resources: salt.  Efforts to generate power from the salinity
difference between seawater and fresh water from rivers and
lakes are already well advanced in Europe, where two alternative
approaches are being tried out.  Last week Redstack, based in
Sneek in the Netherlands, was granted permits to build a pilot
salt battery at the Afsluitdijk dyke in the north of the
country, fuelled by waters from an inland lake and the North
Sea. The plant should initially be able to deliver 5 kilowatts,
but the company wants to increase this to 50 kilowatts over the
next few years if funding is secured, says director Pieter Hack.
The company already has a small pilot plant operating on waste
water from a salt mine in the same area.  Red sea power  Its
salt battery is based on a proces