Marine Science- Ocean Waves
The movements of water molecules moves in circles that get smaller with depth and eventually stop altogether. The waves transmit across the sea is energy. And the highest surface part of a wave is called the crest and the lowest part is trough. The verticle distance between the crest and the trough is the wave height. The horizontal distance between two adjacent crest or trough is known as the wave length.
The wind generates the sea surface by the friction between the air and water kicks up a series of small ripples. When the wind pushes against, the ripples grow into waves, the waves grows higher, longer, and faster and matches the speed of the wind. The largest wave on earth are mostly in the Antarctica and the Indian Ocean.
Wave train develops into a series of harmonious, rounded swells and keep moving in open sea it encounter other sets in different direction and different speeds, heights, and lengths. When the wave energy interact with the wave train it produce large, or rogue wave. It can reach a height of 100 feet and are responsible for many shipwreck. The shallow water changes dramatically, the deepest circling water molecules come in contact with the seafloor. Friction between the seafloor and the water changes the speed direction, and shape of the waves.
The waves collapses into foaming sheets of water that rolls up and down at the beach carrying along sand and gravel. Tsunami are more stronger and can remodel the coast. Tsunami height is three feet or less, waves crest are miles apart and the waves can travel fast at the speed of a jet. Tsunami can cause geoligic event that pushes away a mass of water. Like underwater landslides, volcanic eruptions, but mostly earthquake causes a tsunami.
What a generator design does is rely on the up and down motion of waves to spin turbines. Estimate wave power could supply two times the electricity the world currently consumes. About 1 million people have been killed by a tsunami, but in 2004 more than 250,000 people have been killed from Indonesia to Africa. Many government are working to install warnings systems and rebuild natural coastal barriers.