Air Pollution Control Equipment Services Reasons to be Excited about Hydropower’s Future Hydropower supporters have reason to believe the future is bright for the world’s oldest and most-widely used source of renewable energy. Clarion Energy Content Directors 10.25.2016 Share By Bob Gallo, president and CEO of York, Voith Hydro, Inc. Hydropower supporters have reason to believe the future is bright for the world’s oldest and most-widely used source of renewable energy. No other source of energy combines hydropower’s affordability, contributions to combating climate change, and job creation. Far from an old and conventional source of energy, clean and renewable hydropower is constantly evolving and searching for new methods to squeeze energy out of the approximately 80,000 U.S. dams that do not produce power. In many cases, hydropower provides backup generation to support the development of intermittent energy sources such as wind and solar. Nationally, hydropower’s benefits are unsurpassed. Reliance on hydropower reduces carbon dioxide emissions by 200 million metric tons each year – the equivalent of taking 38 million passenger cars off the road. All told, over 300,000 people work in the hydropower industry, and it also offers the lowest levelized cost of any source of energy. Indeed, many states throughout the country, particularly in the Pacific Northwest, enjoy low energy prices in large part due to their reliance on hydropower. What’s more, we expect hydropower’s importance to grow in the coming years. Over the summer, the Department of Energy released its long-awaited Hydropower Vision Report, a comprehensive analysis that details several pathways to fully utilize our water resources. The report finds that we can boost hydropower generation by 50 GW by 2050 through a combination of new conventional hydropower, pumped storage, small hydro development, and emerging technologies such as Voith’s StreamDiver designed for deployment on many of the very streams previously thought unfeasible for hydropower. One of the major hurdles standing in the way of the hydropower industry is the current regulatory climate. Over the past year, Congress has debated and ultimately passed legislation that would streamline the regulatory process for hydropower – a process many believe is hindering its development. The Energy Policy Modernization Act, which also addresses regulations governing the development and use of many other sources of energy, would smooth licensing by declaring the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) as the lead agency in what can be a very long and costly process that touches multiple jurisdictions, agencies, and even governments. Without a clear lead agency and defined time frames and deadlines, otherwise promising – but capital intensive – projects can languish for years on end. While Congress has made significant progress on this legislation in a time otherwise noted for stalemate, as of September, House and Senate negotiators had still yet to iron out their differences. When Congress returns to session after the November elections, it should make final passage of the Energy Policy Modernization Act one of its top priorities before the end of the year. Make no mistake: without important regulatory reforms, our country will find it difficult to meet its growing energy needs. Nearly 500 hydropower projects, representing over 15% of our current installed capacity, will be up for relicensing in the next 15 years. At the same time, numerous coal-fired power plants will be retired due to environmental regulations and global market forces. This energy will need to be replaced with clean and baseload power. Every effort should be made to ensure hydropower lives up to its tremendous potential and delivers clean and affordable electricity to homes and businesses from coast to coast. The release of the Hydropower Vision report reminds us that we can and must do more to responsibly develop our precious water resources. With the passage of the Energy Policy Modernization Act, we will take a step to live up to the tremendous potential quantified in the report and ultimately deploy more hydropower in every corner of the country. Related Articles 8 Rivers, Siemens Energy collaborate on gas turbine decarbonization Indiana’s consumer advocate wants to thwart Duke Energy’s carbon capture study Calpine, DOE enter cost share agreement for Houston carbon capture demonstration Installing carbon capture in Utah would be tough. But is that debate missing the point?
