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Hydro Resource Evaluation Tool
physical characteristics of a hydro site
The correct estimation of long term resource availability is a key component of hydropower design for both generation capacity estimation and environment protection.
This section describes the assessment of water resource available for a proposed hydropower scheme.
As you move through the tiered stages you will improve the confidence in your estimation of resource availability. You can skip stages, but note that each stage is more time consuming and expensive than the previous hence which stage you start at will be based upon your own confidence in the potential for a hydropower scheme.
As described within section 2.1 of the British Hydropower Association ‘Guide to UK mini-hydro developments’ (2006), your potential power is based upon your flow within the river (the volume of flow passing per second) and the gross head (the maximum available vertical fall of the water, through flowing down a hillside, or passing over a waterfall or manmade weir).
tier 1. scoping studyThis scoping study of resource availability is to provide a methodology of ‘how much water a river can provide’. You do not need prior knowledge of hydrology to carry out this study. This appriach does not describe the flow variability throughout the year.
If you whish to look at variability of flow you should proceed to ‘Tier 2, Intermediate - Desktop study’.
tier 2. intermediate - desktop studyThe variability in flows throughout the year due to climatic variations is often described by flow statistics, primarily the flow duration curve (FDC). This section is about different methods for estimating the flow statistics.
tier 3. final - field data collectionThis section is on how local measured data at the outlet of the proposed scheme can be used to further improve the estimate of resource availability.
