Identifying high energy density stream-reaches through refined geospatial resolution in hydropower resource assessment

Journal Article · Thu Jan 07 00:00:00 EST 2016 · Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)WR.1943-5452.0000599· OSTI ID:1250404

Pasha, M. Fayzul K. ^[1]; Yang, Majntxov ^[2]; Yeasmin, Dilruba ^[2]; Saetern, Sen ^[2]; Kao, Shih -Chieh ^[3]; Smith, Brennan T. ^[3]

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1. California State Univ.-Fresno, Fresno, CA (United States)
2. California State Univ., Fresno, CA (United States)
3. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)

Benefited from the rapid development of multiple geospatial data sets on topography, hydrology, and existing energy-water infrastructures, the reconnaissance level hydropower resource assessment can now be conducted using geospatial models in all regions of the US. Furthermore, the updated techniques can be used to estimate the total undeveloped hydropower potential across all regions, and may eventually help identify further hydropower opportunities that were previously overlooked. To enhance the characterization of higher energy density stream-reaches, this paper explored the sensitivity of geospatial resolution on the identification of hydropower stream-reaches using the geospatial merit matrix based hydropower resource assessment (GMM-HRA) model. GMM-HRA model simulation was conducted with eight different spatial resolutions on six U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) 8-digit hydrologic units (HUC8) located at three different terrains; Flat, Mild, and Steep. The results showed that more hydropower potential from higher energy density stream-reaches can be identified with increasing spatial resolution. Both Flat and Mild terrains exhibited lower impacts compared to the Steep terrain. Consequently, greater attention should be applied when selecting the discretization resolution for hydropower resource assessments in the future study.

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• Grant/Contract Number: AC05-00OR22725
• OSTI ID: 1250404
• Journal Information: Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management, Vol. 142, Issue 4; ISSN 0733-9496
• Publisher: American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

42 ENGINEERING
13 HYDRO ENERGY