Hoes Olivier A C, Meijer Lourens J J, van der Ent Ruud J, van de Giesen Nick C
Department of Water Management, Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, Delft, the Netherlands.
Witteveen+Bos Raadgevende ingenieurs B.V., Deventer, the Netherlands.
PLoS One. 2017 Feb 8;12(2):e0171844. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0171844. eCollection 2017.
Population growth, increasing energy demand and the depletion of fossil fuel reserves necessitate a search for sustainable alternatives for electricity generation. Hydropower could replace a large part of the contribution of gas and oil to the present energy mix. However, previous high-resolution estimates of hydropower potential have been local, and have yet to be applied on a global scale. This study is the first to formally present a detailed evaluation of the hydropower potential of each location, based on slope and discharge of each river in the world. The gross theoretical hydropower potential is approximately 52 PWh/year divided over 11.8 million locations. This 52 PWh/year is equal to 33% of the annually required energy, while the present energy production by hydropower plants is just 3% of the annually required energy. The results of this study: all potentially interesting locations for hydroelectric power plants, are available online.
人口增长、能源需求不断增加以及化石燃料储备的枯竭，使得寻找可持续的发电替代方案成为必要。水力发电可以取代天然气和石油在当前能源结构中的很大一部分贡献。然而，此前对水电潜力的高分辨率估计都是局部性的，尚未在全球范围内应用。本研究首次基于世界上每条河流的坡度和流量，正式对每个地点的水电潜力进行详细评估。理论水电总潜力约为每年52太瓦时，分布在1180万个地点。这每年52太瓦时相当于每年所需能源的33%，而目前水力发电厂的能源产量仅为每年所需能源的3%。本研究结果：所有潜在的有趣的水力发电厂选址都可在网上获取。
