A single underwater cable supplies Beaver Island with its power.
Storms, which are becoming increasingly frequent and severe with climate change, have knocked out the lights for days. A maritime accident once cut electricity for months in the 600-person island 30 miles off the coast of western Michigan.
What if water surrounding Beaver Island could be the key to delivering the small island with more reliable — and clean — power?
Backed by a $3.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation, researchers at the University of Michigan are working with island residents to explore converting wave energy into electricity. If they’re successful, naturally occurring waves would make the remote community more resilient to climate change and mitigate climate change-fueling carbon emissions.
Remote islands with compromised grid reliability are early candidates for nascent wave energy converters. Once the technology is established and costs drop, the renewable power source is expected to complement solar and wind power in urban coastal communities as well, said Vishnu Vijayasankar, a doctoral candidate leading the university’s efforts.
Vicky Fingeroot, a Detroit native, began traveling to Beaver Island in 2006.
“I never thought about energy or how we got it when I bought my first piece of property here back then,” she said.
It wasn’t until she moved to Beaver Island full time in 2021 and experienced her first power outage that grid reliability crossed her mind.
A strong storm took down multiple overhead power lines that carry electricity ashore from the underwater line. More weather was on the way, so plane and ferry services were paused. There was no way on or off the island. The local line worker who knew how to turn on the backup generator was attending an out-of-town funeral.
“It was the perfect storm, no pun intended,” said Fingeroot, who was on the board of trustees for one of the island’s two townships. Left without power for several days, her community’s vulnerability was suddenly thrust in front of her.
“What about the elderly who need oxygen? What were they going to do? And are there warming centers?” she recalled worrying.
When the emergency diesel generator was finally turned on, it powered only the two main business roads on the north end of the island. Many residents on the island’s southern end had to rely on personal propane generators until the lines were repaired. Both diesel and propane generators are polluting technologies.
The generator had been installed after an outage in winter 1999 that lasted over three months. The lake froze over, inhibiting service technicians from reaching the underwater power cable, which had been nicked by a tugboat anchor. The island had expressed interest in exploring renewable energy sources then, but the technologies were new and still expensive, said Beth Croswhite, who has lived on the island for over four decades and served in local government.
The 2021 outage, an influx of clean-energy funding under the Biden administration and dramatic decreases in the cost of renewables revived conversations about renewable energy.
Beaver Island was one of 12 communities selected to reenvision its energy grid with support from the Department of Energy. Much of the focus in the program so far has been on solar power.
The community also was approached by researchers at the University of Michigan seeking to explore wave energy as an additional carbon-free power source.
In the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, remote communities are exploring tidal energy as well. Tides — changes in water level caused by the gravitational pull of the sun and moon — are too small in the Great Lakes. But waves, which are caused by strong winds and changes in atmospheric pressure, are abundant in the fall and early winter.
Originally from India, Vijayasankar couldn’t believe how much wave activity Lake Michigan had when he first visited in October.
“I went (to the shore) during October and there was a crazy amount of waves. I was like, ‘Oh my God.’ I was worried that our device might not be able to withstand Lake Michigan,” he said.
At the most basic level, a wave energy converter uses the rise and fall of the water to move a motor. That kinetic energy gets run through a generator that converts it to the electric energy needed to power homes and businesses.
Wave energy converters are less common than wind turbines and solar panels, largely because of design challenges.
One design makes floating buoys that bob up and down with the crest and trough of the waves. Another depends on the crest of the waves to compress air in a chamber, forcing it up through a turbine that spins. Every model comes with pros and cons regarding myriad issues, including but not limited to storm resiliency, energy generation and marine life safety.
In the design phase of the Beaver Island project, anticipated to last two years, the university researchers are hosting dinners and creating a survey to ensure their blueprint is accepted by residents. A preliminary survey showed that residents were most concerned about marine life safety, signaling to Vijayasankar that he should nix designs with exposed turbines.
Researchers also will have to address resident concerns about the seasonality of waves. They’re typically stronger during the colder months until the lake freezes over.
Wave energy likely will be a complement to the solar power Beaver Island is also exploring, Vijayasankar said. There may be lots of waves on stormy days when the sun isn’t shining, for example. Large-scale batteries — which scientists are racing to perfect — could help store excess wave energy produced by passing storm systems for later use.
“The end goal is to make us sustainable, and I don’t see us doing it with one thing. I see us doing it with many things,” Fingeroot said. “This wave energy project, there’s certainly an openness to it.”
