Hydro Electric Power Plants Advantages and Disadvantages

Hydro power plants plays an important role in generation of electrical power. Along with the power generation hydro power plants have other advantages such as providing irrigation and drinking water. Disadvantages of hydro power plants exist such as cost, construction period and dependent in the availability of the water. Some of the advantages and disadvantages of hydro electric power plants are given below:

 

Advantages or Merits of Hydro power Plant:

 Hydro electric power plants offer some inherent advantages or merits over other types of power plants which makes hydro power plants more attractive. Some of the advantages of hydro power are given below:

• Hydel energy is the renewable energy source
• Hydro electric power plants does not pose any air pollution problem as in the case of thermal power plants and radiation hazard and waste disposal in the case of nuclear power plants.
• Used as Peak load plant and it responds quickly to change in load. Hydro power plants are well suited for use as peak load plants as it responds quickly to the changing loads and as its part load efficiency is considerably higher compared to other power plants. Reduction in the pat load efficiency of hydro power plants is considerably less whereas there is a rapid fall of the efficiency with reduction in the load for all the types of thermal power plants. Therefore it is more advantage to operate the hydro power plant at different loads depend on the requirement compared to other power generation power plant types. When the peaking power is to be met for a fraction of the day (peak load duration), there is nothing like hydro-power plants which perform more efficiently. The extra-ordinary facility of switching on and off almost instantly of hydro power plant is great asset in maintaining the grid stability.
• Life of hydro power plant is very long (few centuries) compared to thermal and nuclear power plants (lifetime will be few decades). This advantage of hydro power plant longer life is because operation of the hydro power plants will be at atmospheric pressure. On the otherhand operation of the thermal and nuclear power plants will be at higher temperature ad pressure. Therefore life of the operating equipment falls down significantly.
• Hydro power plants have advantages of no standby losses which are unavoidable for thermal and nuclear power plants
• Hydro-power projects are provide additional benefits or advantages like irrigation, fishery and flood control
• The efficiency of hydel plant does not fall with time unlike thermal and nuclear power plants

 

 Disadvantages or Demerits of Hydro Power Plant:

Hydro power plants also have some disadvantages or demerits compared to other type of power generation sources. Some of the disadvantages are listed below:

• Hydro power plants requires Huge capital and long period for construction (around 10 to 15 years) compared with the thermal power plants having about 3 to 5 years gestation period and lower cost. This is one of the major disadvantage of hydro power plants
• In Hydro power plants power generation quantity is totally dependent on availability of water which depends on the natural phenomenon. The dry year affects the power generation considerably.
• Sites of hydro plants are away from the load centers. For transmission of power to load centers require large investment in transmission lines and it causes loss of power during transmission

Comparing the advantages and disadvantages of the hydro power plant it should be concluded that hydro power plants should act as complement to the thermal and nuclear power sources and should not be used as competitor where the water sources are not abundantly available. Hydro power plants should play a key role in acting as a peak load plant.