River smart power systems

Why is smart management of water resources important?

The smart management of water resources prevents considerable energy generation loss due to abnormal water conditions. Fig. 9. Revenues in the entire system as a function of river flow decrease and temperature increase. The smart management of water resources prevents considerable loss of revenues due to abnormal water conditions.

What is a river water temperature model?

The model predicts the river water temperature based on water flows and thermal power plant discharges, and provides decision-makers the advantage of scheduling the water releases from upstream reservoirs in order to reduce possible power curtailments of downstream thermal power plants with once-through cooling.

Does smart management of water resources prevent loss of revenue?

The smart management of water resources prevents considerable loss of revenues due to abnormal water conditions. Fig. 8, Fig. 9 show that significant loss in generation and revenue occur if the river flow decreases and the water temperature increases. The transition entails the smooth decrease of the energy generation and gross revenue.

Can smart water management reduce power curtailments?

The application to a hydraulic cascade of hydro and a thermal power plants under drought conditions shows that smart water management entails a significant reduction of power curtailments.

How does river temperature affect thermal power plants?

Significant curtailments occur between hour 16 and hour 21 due to the high river temperature in that period of the day. Overall, the low river flow and the high river temperature close to the allowed maximum values, reduce the capacity of the river to remove all of the excess thermal energy from the thermal power plant.