2025 → Present
Task 20
Digital Twins in Hydropower 1.0
Background
The management of basin water resources in catchments with cascade type reservoirs and hydropower plants is complex. Additional reservoirs along tributaries or international basins increase this complexity.
Efficient allocation and sustainable utilization of water resources to promote the efficient use for hydropower generation, ecological protection of river ecosystems, support for flood protection and generally to promote the comprehensive development of the society in a river basin is needed. The Yangtze River Basin in China is taken as an example.
Objectives
Forecasting and dispatching technologies
The objective of this task is the identification and development of integrated forecasting and dispatching models including meteorological and hydrological forecasting.
The experience from hydropower operators in regions and basins where cascade type hydropower systems are operated will help identifying methodologies and numerical tools that are presently used or under development globally. A comparison of different forecasting at dispatching models, different types of input parameters and standard procedures will provide a comprehensive and comparative overview. Climate change aspects will be considered as well.
Operation and maintenance of hydropower stations
The objective of this task are tools and methods to ensure safe and efficient operation and management of cascade hydropower schemes. This includes the optimized utilization and health assessment of equipment and predictive maintenance planning and scheduling. Dispatch will also have to consider electricity market conditions.
Environmental protection of river ecosystems
Task 3 will focus on the analysis of the ecological impact of the hydropower operation, including the future ecological development of the river basin. Protection strategies will be developed including downstream reservoirs. Indicators for protection, ecological evaluation and restoration will be developed. Dispatching models will also serve for ecological purposes.
Decision support for comprehensive utilization of water resources
Decision support systems based on intelligent technologies will be developed.The systems use all available data and models to enable comprehensive decisions about the utilization of basin wide water resources.