Building a Kilometer-Long Pipe Deep Under the Sea

I guess that their engineers do not really need my advice, but I expect that they would use gigantic mirors to add solar heat to the ocean's water, and to increase the thermal efficiency!

I assume that addition cost of such mirors will be negligible to their benefit!

'....use gigantic mirors to add solar heat to the ocean's water...'

The additional capital to build and install giant mirrors, along with the repair and daily cleaning that the at sea environment would require, would probably offset any gains in T_h

The project idea does suffer from the miniscule temperature difference available, so considering places with already above average temp seawater could have large rewards.

Existing power plants attempting to deal with complaints of thermal pollution, might make use of this idea if their effluent and deep cold seawater could be brought close, cheaply enough....but then again, they could just use the cold seawater to cool their condensers and completely skip the additional power plant....

Another idea, utilizing hydrothermal vents, has been discussed here before.

the greatest difference in temperatures will increase the possible output of the plant, notice in the article they are going for 10 MW so all they need is enough working fluid, possibly ammonia to heat up on the surface and turn a turbine then cool it with the lower ocean water. They already use this technology in Alaska with the temperature difference of deep underground and ambient air used to cool, Energy is all around us, it just depends on the people involved and where they want to place the plant as to the method they use. Solar mirrors on a lake to provide solar energy is taking off in europe, but open ocean I don't see that happening, the advantage of the lake is that you keep water from evaporating and generate power at the same time. Otherwise this is a great science project that I believe they are thinking about to provide power on an oil platform rather than the typical natural gas generators to prevent explosions. Oil rigs commonly have a drill casing of a large diameter that may extend up to a kilometer into the ocean.