Facts about hydropower energy

Hydropower is, very to put it simply, energy based on the flow of water. Utilizing liquid movement isn't brand-new: more than 2, 000 years ago, the old Greeks utilized water tires to grind whole grain. In addition, the power of the water has been used to saw wood and energy textile mills and manufacturing flowers.

Why Hydropower?

Hydropower has furnished the Pacific Northwest with clean, renewable and affordable electricity considering that the early 1900s.

1. Providing a green source of energy:
   • Hydropower is a clear, reusable electrical source. It creates no emissions and its own fuel (water) can be utilized at each and every downstream dam.
   • Hydropower is domestic. Our method of getting water is continually replenished through rainfall and snowmelt. We have been perhaps not dependent upon foreign gas materials and their particular feasible disruption.
2. Providing a reasonable and efficient source of energy.
3. In Northwest, electricity from hydropower usually costs $10 per megawatt hour to produce. This compares to $60, $45 and $25 per megawatt hour to produce electrical energy, correspondingly, at nuclear, coal and natural gas plants. To ascertain these price evaluations, planners calculate what it costs to construct, preserve and function these differing generation facilities.
4. Hydropower is more cost-effective than just about any other kind of electrical generation. Its effective at transforming 90 % of available energy into electricity. A fossil gas plant is about 50 per cent effective.
5. Hydropower can very quickly react to energy requirements by being able to be turned-on and off quickly. Other designs of electrical manufacturing, eg a coal power plant, need significant amounts of time to begin or stop making electrical energy.

Northwest Federal Hydro Projects

Residents regarding the Northwest are fortunate to own a clean, renewable source of energy that notably contributes to the Northwest well being. Today, the Northwest depends on hydropower for approximately two-thirds of its electricity and 40 % of all United States hydropower originates from the Columbia and Snake rivers.

US Army Corps of Engineers (21 dams)