Legal System Research On Ocean Renewable Resources Development

The ocean renewable resources mean the renewable natural resources contained in the marine waters, including tidal energy, ocean thermal energy, wave energy, current energy, ocean salinity energy and etc. With the decrease of the fossil energy in the globe and the deterioration of the environment, people begin to pay attention to the development and the utilization of the ocean renewable resources. China has long coastlines and the vast ocean area could provide us with the abundant ocean energy. The development of those ocean renewable resources could not only be helpful for building a friendly energy saving society but also offer some power to the coastal areas. Moreover, the comprehensive utilization of the ocean renewable resources brings certain economic benefit to the local residents.Currently, the development of ocean renewable resources in China mainly focuses on tidal energy, wave energy and current energy, with the development of ocean salinity energy and thermal energy still under trial stage. The small size tidal energy power generation techniques is mature enough and the techniques as well as the equipment could be domestically concluded. The development of current energy and the wave energy have also made great progress in recent years.However, compared with other renewable resources, the development of the ocean renewable energy is still weak and the main reason lies on : Although the ocean renewable energy has a large number of reserves, the low energy density make it not easy to use them; also the cost in the initial stage of development is prohibitive, so it's hard to be operated with the manner of general adoption of the market priciples; certainly, the most important reason is still that it lacks the supporting of related policies and protection of the law, because that the government hasn't paid enough attention to it. By surveying the successful experience of ocean renewable resources development abroad, the government's all-out support and the mandatory provisions of the law would be the enormous motivation to the development of ocen energy.The paper mainly analyses and summarizes five major legel systems about ocean renewable engergy development abroad: renewable portfolio standard, fixed power price system, tax system, renewable energy fund system, government fiscal subsidies system. By studying and comparing these systems carefully, considered the practical situation of our country, the paper came up with the following five law systems that are beneficial to our ocean renewable energy development, namely: comprehensive ocean renewable energy development management system, market financing system of ocean renewable energy development, favourable tax system of ocean renewable energy development, ocean renewable energy development fund system and ocean renewable energy development environmental protection system.