Hydro Power

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2008-12-03T20:49:55Z

Water, water, everywhere, but hardly a drop moving fast enough to produce electricity?

Existing technologies that harness energy from water can only operate if the current is moving at five or six knots, but most of the world"s currents are slower than three knots. Good news! A new cylinder device is able to produce power from a current flowing at less than one knot.

University of Michigan scientists were inspired by the way fish swim to create the cylinder system called Vivace. Water flows around the cylinders creating vortices, which push and pull the cylinders up and down. This energy is then converted into electricity.

The scientists believe that groups of cylinders could be placed in river or sea beds or suspended in the ocean. A field of cylinders covering an area 1km by 1.5km with a current of three knots could power 100,000 homes. Scientists say the technology requires 50 percent less ocean acreage than wave power.

The researchers also say that because the parts move slowly, they are less likely to harm aquatic life than dams or turbines, and their position underwater will keep them from interfering with shipping or being an eyesore.

A prototype is currently being tested in the Detroit River, which has a current of less than two knots. If this technology is successful, it could open up most of the world"s water to power generation, which could result in huge gains towards powering the world on renewable energy.

via Daily Telegraph

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2008-11-04T18:35:14Z

Linton Falls, a hydroelectric dam in Grassington, England, was first built in 1909 - a time when oil lamps were the norm. It was decommissioned in 1948 after light bulbs became commonplace and the region got a main power supply. Since then, it"s been kept as a historic monument.

Recently, though, Linton Falls is being reexamined. A study published by English Heritage (a group dedicated to protecting and promoting English historic sites) argues that the dam, as well as other historic sites, can play a significant role in carbon reduction. And so, the Linton Falls dam will run once again and produce emission-free electricity.

The technology being used is an adaptation of the ancient Archimedes Screw (pictured above), a large screw that was designed to carry water upwards as it turned. The Linton Falls plant will reverse that concept: the adjacent Wharfe River will flow downwards through two screws, spinning them fast enough to generate energy for 100 homes. Each screw is 35 feet long and six feet wide. The plant will generate about 510,000 kilowatt hours of electricity each year, saving around 216 tons of carbon dioxide emissions compared to equivalent fossil fuel-powered generation.

The project is scheduled to be finished by next summer and up to 50 other old mill sites could be up and running next if the Linton Falls site is successful.

Via Daily Mail, Halifax Courier

Image via Creative Commons

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2008-10-15T16:47:05Z

Researchers at the Oregon State University College of Engineering have discovered an efficient way to produce hydrogen from different types of biowaste, including municipal sewage.

The process uses 75% less energy than the traditional water electrolysis method of producing hydrogen, and can be done at a much lower cost, making it a good candidate for hydrogen fuel production. In the lab, researchers are already close to the Department of Energy’s goal of $2 to $3 per gasoline gallon equivalent for hydrogen fuel.

The university describes the process like this:

“In these systems, naturally occurring microorganisms from sewage attach to the surface of an anode and degrade the waste in the sewage, in a device that is something like a battery. The waste decomposes, eventually leaving protons that migrate to the cathode, combine with electrons and generate hydrogen.”

In addition to producing hydrogen, this process also cleans the water, so, ideally, treatment plants could be developed to take in sewage and send out hydrogen fuel and clean water. Imagine sewage becoming a valuable resource. The system can also be adapted to generate electricity directly instead of producing hydrogen.

Beyond hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, this technology could find practical use in developing countries or remote locations where waste treatment and power production are scarce.

via CleanTechnica

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2008-10-15T11:36:00Z

Grist reports that Brazilian plans to dam the Amazon (well - the major tributaries thereof) are going ahead - A Dam Shame.

A new $5 billion hydroelectric dam now under construction on a tributary of the Amazon River in Brazil will seriously mess with the area"s unique environment and wildlife and displace thousands of indigenous residents, critics say. Up to 3,000 families will be displaced when the dam"s reservoir floods, and the project will also likely affect over 450 species of fish, many of which are important to the area"s fishing industry. "

It"s extremely depressing to think that they"re going to be able to build this dam," said Glenn Switkes of International Rivers. "This is an area that is one of the world"s hotbeds of biodiversity." Nevertheless, the Santo Antonio dam is just one of some 70 dam projects planned for Brazil"s Amazon basin region through 2030, including one that would be the world"s third-largest dam.

Despite heavy criticism, Brazilian officials say the country"s planned hydroelectric frenzy is fueled in part by concerns about carbon emissions from power plants. "[I]f you don"t do hydroelectric plants, you"ll have to do thermo-electric plants with carbon and oil," said Environment Minister Carlos Minc.

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2008-09-24T04:24:00Z

Hobart Mercury
Thursday 4/9/2008 Page: 3

Hydro Tasmania has ruled out power rationing despite the state"s record dry. Chief executive Vince Hawksworth said rationing would only damage investor confidence in the industry"s ability to meet demands. Hydro is in the grip of a record dry spell with water storages at just 22.4 per cent of capacity. It has been forced to buy 38 per cent of its power source from Basslink, gas and wind energy suppliers to compensate for its energy downfall.

The increased spending on outsourced power, which cost $100 million last financial year, is fuelling concern that power bills are poised to increase. Outsourcing power has also had a significant impact on the financial footing of Hydro and has renewed concern for its financial stability. Hydro used power rationing in the 1950s and 60s to overcome drought-related power shortages. Despite a $900 million debt, Mr Hawksworth said Hydro Tasmania was not in financial crisis.

He said the Government"s recent transfer of $220 million of Hydro"s debt to Transend had strengthened the balance sheet. "Consequently we have the financial reserves to manage the impact of the low inflows on our revenues," he said. Opposition energy spokesman Peter Gutwein said the Hydro"s position was of grave concern. He called on the State Government to take a more proactive stance on energy conservation. "The Government must take a more strategic approach to power conservation and seriously consider energy conservation," he said.

Mr Hawksworth said while the situation was concerning, Hydro was making moves to ensure a stable future. "Low storage levels and drought are concerning, but we also have to think about the long-tern competitive future of Hydro," he said. "Sure we have short-tern issues to deal with but this is a long-term business that"s been around for decades now and will be around for decades to come." The fears over power supply came as the Hydro announced yesterday it had invested $17.1 million in Victorian electricity retailer Momentum Energy.

Momentum sells accredited GreenPower sourced from wind generation to small to medium sized businesses throughout Victoria, New South Wales. Queensland and South Australia. Hydro has bought 51 per cent and the remaining 49 per cent will be bought in 2010. The investment is expected to secure financial gains for Hydro by tapping into the trend for businesses to turn green.

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2008-09-22T04:00:00Z

Hobart Mercury
Wednesday 3/9/2008 Page: 3

TASMANIA is heading towards summer with its lowest water storages on record, compounding the financial crisis of a drought dogged Hydro. The record dry means the state will be even more reliant on imported power and gas, which will put more pressure on power prices. Hydro Tasmania has had one of its driest winter periods on record and if trends continue until the end of the year the state will have experienced its driest three-year period ever measured.

Hydro"s energy resources manager David Marshall said water storages stood at 22.4 per cent compared with 26.8 per cent at the same time last year. "Our storages are currently the lowest we have seen at this time of year, which is concerning as we head into summer," he said. "August has been disappointing and we are looking to some strong spring rains to build up storages leading into the traditionally drier summer and autumn months." He warned Tasmania would be more reliant on importing energy via Basslink and gas from the Bell Bay Power Station.

"As long as we have adequate inflows, the continued operation of Bell Bay Power Station and the ability to import across Basslink, we are confident we can maintain security of supply without any form of power restrictions," he said. Generation from non-hydro sources had provided 38 per cent of the state"s energy this year. That included 11 per cent from gas, a net Basslink import of 24 per cent and 3 per cent from wind energy.

Mr Marshall said it cost $100 million last financial year to secure power supplies and a similar result was expected this year. Hydro spokeswoman Helen Brain said the financial implications of the dry spell would not be fully known until figures were drawn together in October. She said the cost of maintaining supply continued to have a significant financial impact on the business. The Government is officially the proud owner of a gas-fired power station.

Treasurer Michael Aird yesterday confirmed he had signed the sale and purchase agreement for the Tamar Valley Power Station on Monday. Mr Aird said all of the due diligence required was completed. The Government has portrayed the buy as a great deal, buying the asset for $100 million. But it could cost a further $300 million to complete the half built project.

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2008-09-14T05:07:00Z

Ocean power seems to be appearing in the news with great regularity in recent weeks - the latest story I noticed was in The Guardian, looking at a new turbine design from Oxford that is cheaper and more efficient than earlier designs - Second generation tidal turbines promise cheaper power.

Harnessing the vast energy of the UK"s coastal tides could become much simpler and cheaper with a new design for the next generation of underwater turbines. The device, unveiled by a team of engineers from Oxford University, re-thinks the way power is generated underwater and the inventors believe it will be more robust, more efficient and cheaper to build and maintain than anything in operation today.

There is an immense potential resource of clean energy from the tidal flows around the UK: conservative estimates suggest there is at least five gigawatts of power, but there could be as much as 15GW, equivalent to 15 million average family homes. Tidal generators can harvest the energy of these moving streams, with the added advantage that the resource is, unlike wind, predictable.

There are only a few underwater turbines in operation today and they all operate like underwater windmills, with their blades turning at right angles to the flow of the water. In contrast, the Oxford team"s device is built around a cylindrical rotor, which rolls around its long axis as the tide ebbs and flows. As a result, it can use more of the incoming water than a standard underwater windmill.

At full size, a Transverse Horizontal Axis Water Turbine (Thawt) rotor would be 10m in diameter and 60m long. Connecting two of these together with a generator in the middle could produce around 12MW of power, enough for 12,000 average family homes.

"To do that, you only need three foundations and one generator," said Martin Oldfield, senior research fellow of engineering science at Oxford University. "To do that with a [windmill] would require five foundations and 10 generators."

The Thawt device is mechanically far less complicated than anything available today, meaning it would cost less to build and maintain. "The manufacturing costs are about 60% lower, the maintenance costs are about 40% lower," said Malcolm McCulloch, head of the electrical power group at Oxford"s engineering department.

Inhabitat also has a post on the THAWT design - Oxford Unveils Next-Gen Underwater Turbines.

Underwater turbines that harvest tidal currents have already become an established technology in the world of clean energy. So in order to push the frontier further, a group of engineers at Oxford have been tinkering away on a design that promises to be even more powerful and efficient. The group recently introduced an innovative Transverse Horizontal Axis Water Turbine that will not only collect more energy but require 60% lower manufacturing costs and 40% lower maintenance costs.

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2008-09-13T12:26:00Z

Greentech Media has a report on some emerging examples of biomimicry, particularly a device that echos Viktor Schauberger"s "Trout Turbine" - Water Companies Taking Cue From Nature.

The Vortex Generator is probably one of the few high-tech products inspired by a trout.

The Generator, a large funnel-like device created by Sweden"s Watreco, purifies water with the same forces a trout uses to stay steady in a rushing stream. Water gets poured in the top of the generator, swirls through an ever-tightening coil of channels, and then spits out the other end fleeced of harmful chemicals and microbes. Water mixed with coffee grounds? Toilet water? It comes out clear.

The impurities are ejected because the swirling action of the draining water causes them to converge into a dense, removeable beam, sort of like how tea leaves bunch together when you swirl a cup fast. A vacuum at the base of the Generator then sucks them out. There are no moving parts and little, if any, external power.

"You either are against it and don"t believe it, or you say there might be something in it," says CEO Mats Eliasson.

An Austrian forestry expert named Viktor Schauberger championed ideas about natural water flow in the first few decades of the 20th century, said CTO Curt Hallberg. He was derided as a kook, particularly when he brought up the part about the fish, but his ideas are gaining new currency. (Fish can do this because water rushes into their mouths and swirls out the gills.). Schauberger concocted something called the Trout Turbine and the Vortex Generator sort of evolved from that line of thinking.

PARC, the tech lab spun out from Xerox, has come up with a spiral that can purify water in a similar manner (see Toner Tech Clears Water).

When it comes to water technology, nature appears poised to become a major player. Similar to the Watreco and Parc situation, a group of startups – Novozymes and Aquaporin – are facing off against an industrial giant – Danfoss – in an effort to create a water-purification system based around a synthetic version of a protein called aquaporin.

In nature, aquaporins sit inside channels in biological cells where water, salts and solids pour in. At a particular instant, the aquaporin flips over, ejecting the impurities and allowing fresh water to pass through the cell. Novozymes is working on the protein and Aquaporin the company is building membranes and arrays to hold them. They hope to get workable water-purification units to semiconductor makers by 2011 or so and then may go after the desalination market.

"It needs one fifth of the pressure of reverse osmosis and you get five times the water flow," said Aquaporin CEO Peter Holme Jensen. The picture [below] is an artist"s illustration of the protein in action.

Synthetic biology (creating molecules found in nature through synthetic, industrial processes) and biomimicry (industrial design that exploits a design advantage in nature.) are already part of the startup world. Pax Scientific, funded in part by Khosla Ventures, has come up with an energy-efficient PC fan. Cambrios, founded by MIT professor Angela Belcher, has devised semiconductor insulating material based on secretions of bacteria.

But the trend could be particularly promising in water. Why? It"s everywhere, even Mars. Natural ways to channel the stuff have evolved over eons. Water purification companies also aren"t transforming the molecule. They want to take out added impurities, but they aren"t making the stuff or removing atoms. Compare that to the effort to synthetically harness the photosynthesis process.

Third, interest and investment in water technology is growing at a time when synthetic biology and biomimicry are gaining credence (see Investors High on Water and Water-Investment Drought Over?). It wasn"t the case five years ago. When venture capitalist Steve Jurvetson, an early advocate, would give talks on synthetic biology, a lot of people would raise their eyebrows in incomprehension.

Fourth, commercialization isn"t that far off for some of these devices. Watreco, in fact, already sells a version of its generator for making ice.

Another article with a watery theme is this one from Greentech Gazette on the increasing interest in atmospheric water generators (an alternative to desalination plants in regions without access to non-fresh water - Atmospheric Water Generators Rising Like an Uncloudy Day.

When I was a kid in the 60’s and 70’s we had a dehumidifier that could pull the water out of the humid Midwest summer air and make it reasonably more comfortable. Now manufacturers have upgraded this concept and added all sorts of fancy filtration to it so that the agua is drinkable.

In fact, atmospheric water generators are so hot right now even famed crooner and environmentalist Willie Nelson has jumped on board. Forget that Bio-Willie biofuel stuff and the other ventures the country vocalist has been into. Now, Willie’s making water and money by partnering with Wataire International.

Not only does the atmospheric water generator suck the moisture from the surrounding air, but it also cleans and purifies it with a series of HEPA and carbon filters plus UV light. A company called Xziex has also announced their atmospheric water generator as well.

Seeking to replace some of the bottled water market in the more humid regions of the nation, Xziex is well, pulling water out of thin air and you don’t have to worry about the environmental impact of shipping small plastic bottles of water from Fiji or some other nonsense.

There is another market for atmospheric water generators that a few companies are just now exploring and this is for developing nations. Much of the world as we know it still exists without clean drinking water. Atmospheric water generators may help those in developing nations, outlying areas and places where clean drinking water is prohibitive.

Now couple these atmospheric water generators with a renewable energy source such as a small wind turbine or a few small solar panels and you truly have a sustainable source of clean water.

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2008-09-05T12:36:00Z

Bloomberg reports NZ"s beleaguered hydro system has had some good rains on the mainland lately - N.Z. South Island Power Prices Decline as Dams Fill.

Power prices on New Zealand"s South Island almost halved after heavy rain on the southern ranges helped restore hydroelectric reserves.

Power at Benmore, the pricing reference point for some of the largest dams operated by Meridian Energy Ltd., cost NZ$62 ($42) a megawatt-hour at 4 p.m. local time. It cost NZ$107 the same time a day earlier and averaged NZ$177.25 on Sept. 1.

South Island power prices have been above average most of the year because low rainfall drained hydro dams and reduced transmission capacity limited supplies sent from the North Island. The region from Fox Glacier to Otira may receive as much as 250 millimeters (9.8 inches) in the next 24 hours, Metservice Ltd. said. Heavy rain in Fiordland should ease today.

``We are getting some water in the right places,"" Meridian spokesman Alan Seay said in a telephone interview. ``It"s falling in both of our catchments and it looks like we may get some more yet. There"s another front looming at the weekend.""

New Zealand usually sources more than 60 percent of its power from dams on lakes and rivers, the largest of which are on the South Island. Since June, the island"s power prices have remained almost double those in Auckland on the North Island, where new generation and ample rainfall have cut energy costs.

Reduced capacity on the power lines linking the two islands limited supplies from the north and compounded the problem, slowing plans by Rio Tinto Alcan to resume full production at the country"s Tiwai Point aluminum smelter. Output was cut 11 percent in May to conserve water as power prices soared.

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2008-09-02T11:13:00Z

The Scottish government seems keen to hit its renewable energy targets, with the latest initiative being a new generation of hydropower facilities - Scotland hopes for big increase in hydro power.

A new generation of large hydroelectric dams and smaller plants across the Highlands could produce enough clean energy for more than half a million homes, a ministerial taskforce has estimated.

A report published today by Scottish ministers suggests that up to 128 new dams and scores of smaller schemes powered by the natural flow of a river could be built across the western and southern Highlands, generating enough electricity for a quarter of Scotland"s homes. Scottish executive officials said this would be a "significant step forward" to meeting the Scottish National party"s ambitions of generating half the country"s electricity from renewable sources by 2020.

Yesterday, water began flooding into the reservoir for the largest new hydro scheme to be built in a generation after the first minister, Alex Salmond, ceremonially closed a sluice gate at Glendoe, a 200 megawatt scheme buried under a mountain near Loch Ness.

The report is due to be presented today by the Scottish energy minister, Jim Mather, who expects it will greatly boost the SNP"s claims that Scotland can become the "Saudi Arabia of renewable energy" - a claim based on the country"s significant natural wind, wave and tidal power resources.

The report estimates these new dams could increase Scotland"s hydro-power output by 50%, taking it to more than two gigawatts and potentially meeting a quarter of the estimated 8GW of renewable energy needed to meet the 2020 target.

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