HYDROELECTRIC ENERGY

A clean source of energy.

SELECTION OF PROJECT

Today as the Indian economy progress rapidly the requirement for energy resources
increase along with it. Currently, India’s main source of energy remains to be fossil
fuels, mineral and other non-renewable sources. Their extensive exploitation is
causing a resource depression.

Renewable energy is a clean form of energy which is obtained from renewable

resources which are naturally replenished on a human time scale. There resources
include sunlight, rain, wind geothermal heat, tides and waves. Accounting for
approximately 16.1 %, renewable energy generation in India is continuing to surge
immensely. One of the forms of renewable energy is hydroelectric power which
utilizes water in dams along with flowing water in rivers to generate electricity in
hydropower plants.

The reason why I have selected this topic is, that as India progresses, the use of
non-renewable sources of energy also increases. This topic allows me to study more
about Hydroelectric Energy and to understand the reason it is being used on such a
large scale, globally.

HYPOTHESIS

It is important to overcome this increasing depletion of fossil fuels, shifting

Mumbai’s main source of energy to Hydroelectric power plants could possibly
decrease the burden of resource depletion and also decrease the high amount of
pollution coursed by burning of fossil fuels to provide energy.

OBJECTIVES

1. To understand the benefits of Hydroelectric Energy.

2. To understand what hydropower is.
3. To study the process of energy production from Hydroelectric power plants.
4. To find out current energy supplied by Hydroelectric power plants.
5. To study the drawbacks of Hydroelectric Power plants.
6. To investigate whether the drawbacks of Hydropower plant can be connected
to maximize their efficiency and make them safer for the environment.
7. To understand why hydroelectric energy is better for the environment sources.
8. To find out whether these are better renewable sources than Hydroelectric to
meet Mumbai’s energy needs.
9. To create awareness about the expanding Hydroelectric technology.
10.To find out whether Hydroelectric power plants have any other benefits apart
from producing energy.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

1. Name : Charles Simeons

Topic : Hydro-power: The use of water as an Alternative Source of Energy.
Date : April, 1980
Publisher: Pergamon press
2. Name : Chelikani Venkata Jagannath Varma and B. L. Jalana
Topic : A century of Hydro Power Development in India.
Date : 1997
Publisher : Central Board of Irrigation and Power
3. Name : kamta Prasad and R.S. Goel
Topic : Environmental management in Hydro Electric projects
Date : 2000
Publisher : Concept publishing company.
4. Name : B. Honningsvag, G.H. Midttomme, K. Repp, K. Vaskinn and T.
westeren
Topic : Hydropower in the New Millenium
Date : 2001
Publisher : CRC press
5. Name : Iiver Yuksel
Topic : Development of Hydropower: A case study in Developing Countries
Date : 2010
6. Name : Bikash Pandey and Ajay Karki
Topic : Hydroelectric Energy: Renewable Energy and the Environment
Date : 17th November, 2016
Publisher : CRC press
 7. Name : Josepha Sherman
Topic : Hydroelectric power
Date : 2004
Publisher : Capstone
8. Name : Paul Breeze
Topic : Hydropower
Date : 26th March, 2018
Publisher : Academic press

RELEVANCE

Hydroelectric power plant in one of the major power plants all over the world
in order to create electricity. It is also one of the best renewable energy sources on
the planet Earth. The efficiency of this power source is 90% and this is very impressive
as the percentage efficiency is very high.

Billions of people depend on hydroelectricity every day. It proves homes,

offices factories, hospitals and schools. Hydroelectric energy in usually one of the first
methods a developing country implements to being affordable electricity to usual
ocean.

Hydroelectricity helps improve the hygiene, education and employment

opportunities available to a community. India, for instance, has built dozens of dams
over the past decade, as their development has grown.

Engineers control the amount of water let through the dam. The process used
to control this flow of water is called the intake system. When a lot of energy is
needed, most of the tunnels to the turbines are open, and millions of gallons of water
flow though them. When less energy in needed, engineers slow down the intake
system by closing source of the tunnels.

Currently, India has a hydro potential found to be about 84000MW at 60%

capacity factor. Along with that 6780 MW in term of installed capacity from small,
mini, and micro Hydel schemes have been assessed. Also 56 sites for pumped charge
scheme with an aggregate installed capacity of 94,000 MW have been identified for
fulfilling the high electricity depend and water pumping for irrigation needs. The
largest completed hydel power project in India is constructed across Koyna River in
Maharashtra. Its name is koyna hydroelectric project and has the capacity of 1960
MW. In India, renewable energy accounts for 16.1% of the total installed capacity and
Hydropower makes up 14.01% of this.

Moreover, wildlife habitat can undergo flooding when hydroelectric plants are
built, and can have dynamitic impacts on a local ecosystem and the animals and
plants that live there. Wildlife migrations may be dramatically alerted, and there may
be a loss of suitable habitat as well as a loss of important species.

Along with that, after a dam construction, many times fish are unable to swim
upstream as a result they may be injured or even killed by hydroelectric power
turbines. To aid the passage of fish, fish ladders or elevators can be added to the
hydroelectric dams along with implementing screens, racks and lights to reduce fish
injuries and fatalities. Fish ladders are a series of wide step built on the side of the
river and dam. The ladder allows fish to slowly swim upstream spill flow can also be
minimized beyond the turbines to artist with fish passage.

Hydroelectric power plants and dams utilize the flow of water; this also alters
the natural flow of rivers. Algal blooms can occur in reservoirs due to a lack of
dissolved oxygen levels that result in more stagnant water conditions.

Therefore Hydropower is the most suitable form of energy to be used as the

main energy supply for a city like Mumbai. It could also be used as a major energy
provider for India due to its high efficiency and output.

PROPOSED METHODOLOGY

I have chosen survey method.

DESCRIPTION OF METHOD

A survey is a list of questions aimed at extracting specific data from a particular group
of people.

I conducted a survey on 20 people, asking them questions about hydroelectric energy.

1. Are you aware of the hydroelectric technology?

2. Do you think hydroelectric energy is a clean source of energy?
3. Do you know about any other types of renewable sources?
4. According to you, is hydroelectric energy being able to meet the energy needs
of our country?
5. Do you think it is necessary to create wave awareness about hydroelectric
energy and its benefits?
6. Do you think most people in India know the damage caused by combustion of
fossil fuels?
7. Are you familiar with the advantages of hydroelectric energy over other
renewable and non-renewable sources?
8. Do you think hydropower plants will course a lot of damage to surrounding
environment, in which they are built?
9. Do you know why the government is trying to increase the number of
hydropower plants in India?
10.Will increasing the electricity supplied by hydropower plants be beneficial for
our country?
11.Do you think the government should make hydroelectric energy the main
source of energy, reducing the use of fossil fuels to the minimum?
12.Are you aware of the policies that the government has set up in order to aid the
companies who take the initiative to construct hydropower plants?
13.Should the government also focus on coming up with solutions to overcome
the problems caused by hydropower plants in order to maximize their
efficiency?

OBSERVATION:-

I conducted a survey on 20 people, asking them about Hydroelectric energy. Most

of the people thought increasing supply of hydroelectric energy will prove to be
beneficial for the environment and help is decreasing resource depletion.
According to the survey conducted, more awareness needs to be given to energy
producing companies about hydroelectric energy and the government should also
take action to help aid companies in building hydropower plants.

QUESTION YES NO
1 15 5
2 18 2
3 19 1
4 10 10
 5 16 4
6 10 10
7 15 5
8 7 13
9 13 7
10 11 9
11 8 12
12 5 15
13 18 2

ANALYSIS
20
18 YES
16 NO
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

RESULT

The hypothesis is proven to be true. For a progressing country like India,

increasing hydroelectric energy supply will prove to be beneficial, due to its high
efficiency and very few negative environmental impacts. It will also be easy to
supply most part of the countries as it can be produced using local resources.

SUGGESTION

We should try to create more awareness about hydroelectric energy and its
benefits. Along with this, we should try to reduce the consumption of fossil fuel
and replace it with a cleaner, renewable source of energy that is hydroelectric
Energy.

PROJECT REPORT
 Depletion and harmful effects of fossil fuels are becoming major concern
therefore it comes social to implement more sources of renewable energy like
hydroelectric energy, which has been a rapidly growing and very efficient source.
Therefore I have selected this project because it gives me an opportunity to study
more about this energy production technology.

RESULT

The hypothesis is proven to be true. For a progressing country like India,

increasing hydroelectric energy supply will prove to be beneficial, due to its high
energy efficiency and very few negative environmental impacts. It will also be very
easy to supply most part of the country as it can be produced using local resources.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 www.environmentalscience.org
 www.indiaonline.in
 www.energy.gov
 www.national geographic.org
 Hydroelectric energy by tamra orr
 Hydroelectric energy : Renewable Energy and the environment by ajay karki
and Bikash pandey.