1. Needs and potential

Worldwide electricity production is close to 25,000 TWh/year, of which 3,500 TWh is hydroelectric. The average production cost is close to 50 e/MWh.

It is likely that, by mid-century, the world's production of goods will have tripled; energy efficiency will have improved and energy use will have only doubled, but with a much greater proportion in the form of electricity: electricity consumption should roughly triple and probably approach 80,000 TWh/year by mid-century, at a cost of around e100/MWh, with a high proportion of renewable energies in most countries.

The future of tidal energy is therefore linked to a cost of around 100 e/MWh. A large part of the tidal potential is far from points of consumption, but the cost of long-distance electricity transmission can be reduced to 10 e/MWh for 1,000 km, so we can also envisage equipping large,...