Beaver Island tests wave power to cut outages

Beaver Island, Michigan, is moving from mainland-fed electricity to a locally generated option: wave energy. University of Michigan researchers have deployed two prototype devices on the shoreline, showing they can power a light bulb and charge a cell phone. T

On Beaver Island, the water is never far from the story. But for many residents, it’s not just scenery—it’s the potential answer to a problem that keeps returning when the weather turns.

Beaver Island sits in the middle of the northernmost end of Lake Michigan, not far from the Canadian border. The forested island is just a little bigger than San Francisco in size and is home to about 600 permanent residents. Like many remote communities, getting there means a boat or a plane ride.

Electricity, though, comes from mainland Michigan. Cables cross roughly 30 miles of lake bed to deliver power, and outages are common—during extreme weather, and when there are problems with the sensitive wires. Last year’s devastating ice storm knocked out power to the island for weeks.

That history is driving a new experiment. Earlier this month. researchers from the University of Michigan gathered on the shoreline to deploy two devices that convert the kinetic energy of waves into electricity. The gadgets are prototypes that look like small boats framed with PVC pipes and are about the size of a yoga ball. In demonstrations, they powered a light bulb and charged a cell phone.

The project is part of a broader push across the country to use alternative sources of energy to improve reliability in remote places. On Beaver Island. researchers say they spent two years gathering input from residents. who identified providing a dependable source of power to the airport as a priority.

“We need to work with the community together to identify the need and design together with them,” said Lei Zuo, an engineering professor at the University of Michigan and the lead researcher on the project.

Some island residents already rely on renewables. Several use solar panels or geothermal energy, and the island has previously received federal funds to improve access to renewables. But the future of those efforts is clouded. Similar programs and grid modernization plans face uncertainty as the Trump administration cancels grants and programs. raising questions about how projects like this could be funded in the years ahead.

Beaver Island’s wave power bid is rooted in a desire that goes beyond convenience—an urge to reduce dependence on the mainland when systems fail. “It’s a combination of looking at cost savings and also wanting to be independent and not dependent on the mainland for everything. ” said Seamus Norgaard. who lives on the island during the summer. “And then also the environmental outlook.”.

Other communities are chasing that same kind of energy independence. The small Native village of Galena. Alaska. for example. is investing in solar and biomass to reduce reliance on diesel fuel and create a stopgap against extreme weather. In Puerto Rico. residents of Adjuntas developed a community-owned solar microgrid after Hurricane Maria. designed to keep electricity running when the island’s grid inevitably fails; it has also been promoted as a model for other places pursuing locally generated reliability.

Wave power, however, may not replace everything. Dan Hellin, director of PacWave, an offshore testing facility in Oregon, said the technology still needs to find its place. “It’s a combination of looking at cost savings and also wanting to be independent and not dependent on the mainland for everything. ” Norgaard said on Beaver Island—while Hellin stressed that wave energy is one component of a broader renewables strategy. “It’s developing a whole suite of renewables and applying them based on local conditions.”.

Wave power also comes with hard practical hurdles. Despite its potential, it isn’t widely used because it can be expensive and difficult to deploy. It is also still new, with no standardized design yet, Hellin said.

Funding is another bottleneck. Most wave energy projects in the U.S. are funded by the federal government. The Michigan experiment is backed by National Science Foundation grants awarded two years ago. Hellin said marine energy—falling under hydropower—has avoided some of the Trump administration’s animosity toward renewables. “It’s not on the radar in the same way.”.

That matters because early in his second term. President Donald Trump included hydropower among the domestic energy sources his administration would prioritize for regulatory fast-tracking and support. The Department of Energy’s rebranded Hydropower and Hydrokinetic Office said it will use $220 million appropriated by Congress to continue such research.

The University of Michigan’s wave project is not an isolated effort. Teams elsewhere are pushing similar devices toward commercialization. A parallel project is underway in North Carolina’s Outer Banks. PacWave’s work continues in Oregon. a company called CalWave has tested devices off the California coast. and Hawai‘i has hosted a testing site for more than a decade.

While waves on the Great Lakes are smaller and more seasonal than those on oceans. Saeid Bayat of the University of Michigan said the conditions still matter. “The Great Lakes provide real-world wave conditions while being much easier. safer. and less expensive to access than most ocean sites. ” Bayat said. He called the Great Lakes “an ideal experimental bathtub.”.

Back on Beaver Island, the researchers plan to keep improving the prototype. They expect to install a final version in the coming years. and Norgaard said he’s among those watching for what comes next. “There is that excitement about these new futures and cleaner sources, and more locally produced, dependable sources of energy.”.

For a community that has watched its lights go out for weeks after storms, that excitement carries weight—because on Beaver Island, reliability isn’t a slogan. It’s the difference between waiting out the next outage and having power that’s already there.

Beaver Island Great Lakes wave energy renewable energy University of Michigan National Science Foundation power outages grid modernization hydropower PacWave marine energy