Data-Based Performance Assessments for the DOE Hydropower Advancement Project

Conference · Sat Dec 31 23:00:00 EST 2011

OSTI ID:1081924

March, Patrick ^[1]; Wolff, Dr. Paul ^[2]; Smith, Brennan T ^[3]; Zhang, Qin Fen ^[3]; Dham, Rajesh ^[4]

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1. Hydro Performance Processes, Inc.
2. WolffWare Ltd.
3. ORNL
4. U.S. Department of Energy

The U. S. Department of Energy s Hydropower Advancement Project (HAP) was initiated to characterize and trend hydropower asset conditions across the U.S.A. s existing hydropower fleet and to identify and evaluate the upgrading opportunities. Although HAP includes both detailed performance assessments and condition assessments of existing hydropower plants, this paper focuses on the performance assessments. Plant performance assessments provide a set of statistics and indices that characterize the historical extent to which each plant has converted the potential energy at a site into electrical energy for the power system. The performance metrics enable benchmarking and trending of performance across many projects in a variety contexts (e.g., river systems, power systems, and water availability). During FY2011 and FY2012, assessments will be performed on ten plants, with an additional fifty plants scheduled for FY2013. This paper focuses on the performance assessments completed to date, details the performance assessment process, and describes results from the performance assessments.

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)
• Sponsoring Organization: EE USDOE - Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EE)
• DOE Contract Number: AC05-00OR22725
• OSTI ID: 1081924
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English