Because of the Navy’s association with the ocean, the Department intends to be an early adopter of emerging ocean energy technologies. The Department’s Ocean Energy team is evaluating wave, tidal, ocean current, and ocean thermal technologies to determine if they are technically and economically feasible. In 2009, the Navy team awarded five separate contracts to support further development and evaluation of ocean energy systems. Although technical challenges remain and further development/testing is needed before reliable power is commercially available, the combined application of these technologies represent an enormous opportunity to shift away from fossil fuel to renewable energy at naval facilities.