Abstract
Oceanic currents in the Mexican Caribbean have a great potential for energy generation due to its persistency and strength, with velocities above 1 m/s at least 50% of the time. They are close enough to the continent (within 1 km from the shore), due to abrupt bathymetry changes, therefore connection to the national grid is easier. Nevertheless, technological challenges still exist for low velocity scenarios (velocities < 2 m/s), which is the most common around the world. This contribution uses a combination of numerical modelling, satellite altimetry and in-situ measurements to assess the energy availability in the Yucatan current, focusing on the Cozumel Channel. This is an integrative approach that gives considerable advantages. Since power is proportional to velocity cubed, and velocity could be represented as the sum of an average and variability at different frequencies, representing different processes; the interaction of these processes acting at different time scales can be represented with 10 different terms. This provides a novel methodology to assess the energy availability at different sites. We found that the Cozumel current is a “very clean” current with small variability at high frequencies and predominance of the mean velocity cubed term. It is estimated that the cumulative annual power density that could be extracted from this current is in the order of 2 MW/m^2.