Report Shows Potential for Global Small Hydro Growth and Development

Michael Harris, Online Editor, HydroWorld.com
July 25, 2012 | 7 Comments

A new report from energy market analyst GlobalData indicates that governments around the world are beginning to see advantages of small hydropower development, HydroWorld.com has learned.

According to the report, titled "Small Hydropower (SHP) - Installed Capacity, Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE), Competitive Landscape, Opportunity and Key Country Analysis to 2020," global installed hydropower capacity increased from 896.9 GW in 2006 to 1,072.1 GW in 2011.

The report says that number is expected to grow to 1,443 GW by 2020, in part due to an increased emphasis by governments around the world.

GlobalData's research indicates many countries are actively seeking ways to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels and minimize carbon footprints, and small hydro plants have become an attractive solution.

GlobalData says small and mini hydro plants' effects on both the environment and budgets is less substantial than large dams, thereby reducing issues created by deforestation and submergence.

The report also notes that the small plants are quicker to construct and offer higher returns given the low capital investment required and smaller operational and maintenance costs.

China is noted as being the world's largest small hydro market, accounting for 55.3% -- or 59 GW -- of global installed small hydro capacity in 2011. India follows with 9%, and the U.S. rounds out the Top 3 with 6.9%. GlobalData forecasts the cumulative small hydro capacity to increase from its current 106.7 GW to 137.8 GW by 2020.

For more small hydropower news, visit HydroWorld.com's "Small Hydro" topic center.

7 Comments

ANONYMOUS
July 27, 2012

The DOE recently published a map of potential US tidal power resources. While it sure seemed to be impressive in its scope, I still have to wonder how cost effective tidal power really is. The subsea marine environment is incredibly harsh, and I can't imagine a turbine lasting long in such conditions.

For the near term, maximizing use of existing dams and reservoirs with numerous smaller modern, efficient turbine installations would seem to be a much wiser (and attractive) use of investment dollars. We should go after the "low-hanging fruit" first.

Bhola panta
July 27, 2012

Good news. Nepal is the second largest hydro potential in the world.

The government's Foreign Direct Investment Board (FDI) has adopted investment friendly policy to encourage foreign investors for hydro power generation. Also, in the field of Small Hydro Power Project (SHPP) there is huge opportunity.

If any one interested in this potentiality, you can explore the opportunity.

BN Panta

pantbn02@yahoo.com

Bob Wallace
July 27, 2012

Actually, if you place tidal generation over a large geographical area tidal will be inputting from some of those places at just about any time. Check a tide chart for the west coast of the US and you'll see that the tide does not ebb and flow everywhere on the same schedule.

That said, very little on the grid is continuous. People get up in the morning and turn stuff on, factories and stores open for the day, work shuts down, people go to bed. Those are demand changes. Somewhat predictable.

As we move into the future grid we will need to deal with more variable supply than when we depended on "almost always on" coal and nuclear. But even those supplies were/are not continuous. I present for your consideration San Onofre, the nuclear plant that has dropped off the grid following an engineering screwup and and the two Virginia reactors which went offline following an earthquake in 2011.

Nigel Morris
July 27, 2012

@ Bob Wallace
Tidal is great ! It's regular, predictable and green. But it's not continuous, unless you put in place a series of pondages to address the change of tide periods and the ups and downs on either side of tide changes.

Bob Wallace
July 27, 2012

I doubt that 25% of the 80k existing have adequate head and inflow. Perhaps 10% or a bit more. But that's still a lot of power we could tap.

Where do we stand on tapping the Gulf Stream? Tidal is on line in parts of the world and the first US tidal gen is just now being installed in Maine. Probably the same tidal turbines could be placed off the coast of Florida and crank out continuous power.

Jim Case
July 26, 2012

Good grief, the US has like 80,000 man made lakes already in place. The Corp of Engineers has over a thousand. If only 25% of those dams were retrofitted with a turbine or so we could crank out power in untold gigawatts. Now just add in run of river turbines. The Mississippi River has locks and dams that dump water over the spillway 24-7. Put a turbine on it. Yikes!!

ANONYMOUS
July 25, 2012

I would imagine that small hydropower implies 1MW to 10MW. In reality, small hydro has huge potential in many countries, including the US. There is massive potential adding small hydro to existing run-of-river locations, or adding pumped hydro to existing reservoirs. Hydro power is also largely free from the supply/demand problem that commercial wind and solar have.

Most importantly, adding small hydro to underutilized locations results in an LCOE that is very attractive.