Marine energy presents a wide variety of benefits to the communities and stakeholders who may one day use the power source. Marine energy can leverage waves, tides, currents, and differences in water temperature to provide essential power to even the hardest to reach communities. The power source provides a variety of advantages that show why it will play an integral role in achieving U.S. clean energy goals. Listed below are a few significant benefits of marine energy that can help the United States transition to 100% clean electricity by 2035 and net-zero emissions by 2050.

• Marine energy is a renewable, clean source of energy, only requiring water’s natural movement to generate power.
• Marine energy resources are abundant throughout the United States. The country is home to miles of ocean coastline and river resources, posing incredible potential for capitalizing on this resource.
• Marine energy is highly predictable due to the cyclical nature of waves, tides, and currents.
• The predictability of marine energy and its daily and seasonal cycles allow it to complement other energy sources like solar and wind, whose electricity generation usually dips when waves and tides are most powerful.
• Marine energy is a resilient source of energy. Usually positioned close to where power is needed, marine energy technologies would require short transmission lines, supporting the power grid’s reliability and resilience. 
• Marine energy can provide power to remote, coastal, and island communities. By using the water that surrounds these communities, marine energy can power microgrids that support these communities’ homes and businesses.
• Marine energy technologies open the door for other innovations in the maritime sector, such as turning seawater into clean drinking water and powering sea and ocean exploration.
• Marine energy has the ability to create jobs and provide renewable energy to remote or rural communities. As marine energy technologies are deployed, likely in remote coastal or island communities, the jobs will stay there. Because regardless of where the systems are built, there must be people locally to operate and maintain them.
• The marine energy community needs professionals contributing to a diverse set of jobs spanning research, policy, environmental science, ecology, engineering, communication, and outreach, and more.
• Build real-world, hands-on experience working in the blue economy – a multi-trillion-dollar industry growing at twice the rate of the rest of the global economy.