Community Highlights

Field research reported in Hydro Review indicates that Natel Energy’s fish-friendly turbine designs can improve survival outcomes for migratory fish species passing through hydropower facilities. The turbine geometry is engineered to reduce strike probability, minimize shear forces, and manage pressure changes during passage while maintaining generation performance. Early findings suggest the approach offers a viable pathway for projects seeking improved environmental compatibility in ecologically sensitive waterways.

Advances in turbine design that integrate biological performance considerations with energy production objectives represent an important step toward modernized hydropower technologies.

Hydro Review – Research Shows Safe Fish Passage Through Natel Turbines

 

The PSH Cost Model Web App, hosted on OpenEI, provides an interactive framework for estimating the lifecycle costs of pumped storage hydropower (PSH) projects. Users can adjust site characteristics, design parameters, and financial assumptions to evaluate capital expenditures, operations and maintenance costs, and economic feasibility. The platform is designed to support structured cost discussions among developers, planners, and financing partners evaluating long-duration energy storage projects.

By increasing visibility into cost drivers and enabling standardized modeling approaches, the tool advances transparent economic analysis for pumped storage development.

NREL PSH Cost Model Web App

Pumped storage hydropower (PSH) currently accounts for roughly 96% of all utility-scale energy storage in the United States, and a new approach developed by RheEnergise could make PSH appropriate for more applications. Instead of using water, the RheEnergise approach uses an inexpensive proprietary fluid that is 2.5 times more dense than water. The higher density fluid can generate the same amount of power as a traditional pumped storage hydropower facility while using significantly smaller tanks and requiring less elevation change. That makes the approach a better fit for landscapes with less elevation and smaller footprints. Designed to provide long-duration energy storage of up to 50 MW at individual projects, the high-density hydro approach can be co-located with other energy projects and leverage existing grid infrastructure. It’s an innovative, cost-effective approach to energy storage that could unlock more opportunities for PSH development to support the grid. 

Learn more from RheEnergise.

Improving fish passage is key to supporting certain migratory fish populations and minimizing the environmental impacts of hydropower facilities. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) worked with Duke Energy to implement new fish passage technologies at hydropower facilities in North Carolina, during the relicensing process for the Yadkin-PeeDee Hydroelectric Project. 

The new fish passage options were tailored to support American eel, American shad, and blueback herring—species that have experienced population declines in part due to habitat loss. A custom, stainless-steel eelway was added at Blewett Falls Dam, along with an “attraction flow”—a stream of water containing the scent of eels in the eelway—to draw eels towards the entrance of the passage. To support other fish species, inflatable gates were installed across the dam to better control water spill during fish migratory season and a new notch was cut in the dam to support downstream fish passage. In total, these new fish passage technologies have restored access to over one thousand miles of additional habitat in the watershed for eel, shad, and herring. 

Learn more from NOAA.

Turbine maintenance often means costly downtime and time-consuming work, particularly when trying to inspect hard-to-reach areas of turbines. GE’s Hydro Solutions’ underwater roboticized turbine inspection vehicle is an option designed to enable quicker turbine inspections without dewatering the equipment. The remotely operated vehicle (ROV) technology requires few personnel to deploy, which can help reduce the time and cost of inspections. It enables facilities to conduct on-demand inspections of turbines to visually evaluate erosion, cavitation, corrosion, or impact marks. It is an example of an innovative technical advancement that provide real-time insights into the health and performance of hydropower facilities, supporting hydropower’s ability to meet changing energy needs.

Learn more from GE.  

Full-scale testing of new hydropower technologies is key to future hydropower innovations, according to research by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In a report entitled “Needs and Opportunities for Testing of Hydropower Technology Innovations,” the research team highlights the need for hydropower testing facilities that allow full-scale, high hydraulic capacity testing. Such facilities would enable demonstrations of new technologies under realistic operating conditions, lowering the risk for industry adoption. The researchers also identified important characteristics for these testing facilities and some promising pathways to establish such a testing network. 

More information available from Oak Ridge National Laboratory.