Portugal gambles on 'sea snakes' providing an energy boost

"Portugal is poised to open what will be the world's first commercial wave farm ... The Pelamis machines, named after the Latin for sea snake and developed by a Scottish company that leads the world in one of the newest renewable energy fields, are a series of red tubes, each about the size of a small commuter train, linked together, and pointed in the direction of the waves. The waves travel down the tubes, causing them to bob up and down, and a hydraulic system harnesses this movement to generate electricity."
Hurrah for Portugal. Why aren't the UK there as the first? Oh yes: we're too busy pouring research and development money down the plug-hole of nuclear power to invest in truly green energy.
Portugal gambles on 'sea snakes' providing an energy boost | Environment | The Guardian:

Power-generating buoys shelter in the deep

A new kind of generating buoy which sits beneath the storm levels at c.50m. Looks hopeful and is being developed by a British firm and tested offshore in Scotland.

'A town with 55,000 inhabitants would need half a square kilometre of seabed covered with 100 buoys to power it,' says Grey.
He adds that they could be effective in the North Atlantic, from Scotland down to Portugal, along the Pacific US shoreline, from San Francisco in the US up to Vancouver in Canada, along the coast of Chile, and even in South Africa and New Zealand.
But calmer seas, such as the Mediterranean do not have enough wave height to pump the buoy.

Power-generating buoys shelter in the deep - earth - 14 June 2007 - New Scientist Environment: