U.S. Navy's wave-power buoy plays chicken with Irene, wins

So last week Irene was all like, "HERE I AM! I'm going to rock you like myself!" And off the coast of Jersey (where else?) the U.S. Navy's PowerBuoy was like "bring it!"

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Demonstrating that wave power does have its applications, the PowerBuoy not only survived a direct hit by Irene, it apparently spent the duration of the storm doing one-armed pushups while lecturing an implacable force of nature on the Hegelian dialectic:

The PowerBuoy emerged from the two-day storm undamaged and fully operational, with all the buoy’s systems having withstood wave heights of up to 15 meters (nearly 50 feet).

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During the storm, the PowerBuoy continued to supply consistent power to its communications and radar payload, and dissipate the high amounts of surplus energy it produced. In addition, nearly constant communication was maintained with the device throughout the storm, allowing continuous on-land monitoring of the buoy’s status and performance.