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DOI 10.1007/s10333-014-0432-4
ARTICLE
Yuichi Hirose
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Paddy Water Environ
were under construction across Japan as of 2011, and Table 1 Specifications of the dam for the case study
80 % were designed exclusively for supplying irrigation Items Storage
water, i.e., without hydropower plants (Japan Dam capacity (m3)
Foundation 2012). On the average, an irrigation dam
Active storage 23,256,800
serves an irrigation area of 803 ha (71 % of which is
paddy field) with a mean effective storage of 1.76 million Reservoir water levels and storage capacities
m3 (MAFF 2005). Full water level (FWL) 299.5 (m) 23,355,800
Since most of these dams are designed solely for paddy Limited water level 294.4 (m) 16,906,480
in flood seasona
field irrigation, discharges tend to fluctuate by season.
Water level for the rule curve 280.0 (m) 4,295,700
Discharges increase during the paddy irrigation season on 10th September
from late April to early September to meet irrigation Minimum water level (MWL) 259.9 (m) 99,000
water demands, but decrease in other months to restore
Designed maximum tail water discharge Qbmax
reservoir storage for the next irrigation season. On the 3
Land preparation period 7.29 (m /s) –
other hand, hydropower plants are operated more effec- (26/April–10/May)c
tively under a steady discharge rate (US Army Corps of Paddy irrigation period 7.43 (m3/s) –
Engineers 1985). This implies a need to balance these two (11/May–10/September)c
contrastive objectives, i.e., irrigation and hydropower Non-irrigation period 7.43 (m3/s) –
generation, from the viewpoint of water management, if a (11/September–25/April)
hydropower plant is installed ex-post at existing irrigation Irrigation area 4,265 (ha) –
dams. a
Same as the spillway crest level. Applicable from 1/July to
Much research has been done on how to optimize the 30/September
design of newly-built multi-purpose dams for irrigation and b
During the land preparation and paddy irrigation periods, the
hydropower. For instance, Cai et al. (2003) and Rosegrant designed maximum tail water discharge Qmax shall coincide with the
et al. (2000) developed an integrated hydrologic–agro- maximum allowable withdrawal rate of a canal system at a down-
stream weir, which is authorized by the river regulating authority.
nomic–economic model for river basin management that (Note that water is first released from the dam into a river and
balanced multiple water uses, by building a model on a recollected at a weir downstream.) During the non-irrigation period,
large range of input data from root-zone crop water con- by contrast, the maximum allowable withdrawal rate downstream is
sumption to river hydrology. Similarly, Lall and Miller actually 0.832 (m3/s). Nevertheless, the dam operator sometimes
chooses to release water through a penstock in excess of this rate to
(1988) proposed a model to determine optimal storage regulate floods, etc. Therefore, in computing a tail water discharge
capacities for reservoirs, which maximized the expected with Eq. 1, we assume Qmax is 7.43 (m3/s) in this period
net benefits. Johnson et al. (1991) conducted similar opti- c
Periods broadly termed as the ‘‘irrigation period’’ in text and figures
mization studies with the objective of minimizing expected
shortages of water. Georgakakos et al. (1997) and Tilmant
and Kelman (2007) developed models to optimize water probable strong opposition by farmers. Therefore, using a
management for multi-reservoir systems. Such compre- current dam operation scheme as a benchmark may be
hensive approaches are certainly effective for planning helpful to determine any changes under an alternative
optimal water management schemes for a new dam or a water management scheme after installing a hydropower
river basin. plant, and to gain the understanding of farmers.
On the other hand, water management planning for ex- Following this line of argument, few studies have
post installation of a hydropower station at an existing investigated water management with hydropower annex-
irrigation dam may as well rely on a more focused ation at an existing dam. Cobaner et al. (2008) employed an
approach for some reasons. First, comprehensive models artificial neural networks method to predict hydropower
are too complex for a local administrative officer in charge potentials at several irrigation dams in Turkey. Their study
of a small irrigation dam. Therefore, a simple and acces- was based on monthly inflow data, but highly variable
sible model is needed. Second, unlike water management hydrologic conditions in Japan may require a model using
planning at a new dam, any alteration of a water man- daily data. Oven-Thompson et al. (1982) examined a
agement scheme as a result of hydropower annexation may modified water release plan at the High Aswan Dam to
be constrained by the current scheme whose sole purpose is increase the value of water, and recommended increasing
irrigation. For instance, Cobaner et al. (2008) noted that, in firm hydropower production by restructuring the current
such a situation, it was necessary to generate energy in cropping patterns in the Nile Delta. Although their
strict compliance with the irrigation schedule to avoid the approach provided valuable insights, the conclusions may
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ηq
ation of hydropower at an existing irrigation dam, and 0.80
ηh
collected at an anonymous irrigation dam in the Tohoku
region of northeast Japan. The dam is a concrete gravity 0.85
dam possessing a penstock (conduit for conveying tail 0.80
water discharge) with a Howell-Bunger valve and an
0.75
overflow spillway with radial gates. It was constructed in
0.70
1961 without a hydropower plant, and is still operated as an
0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6
irrigation-only dam. Selected specifications of the dam are Relave effecve head rh
shown in Table 1. The data collected consist of dam res-
ervoir water level, total discharge, and reservoir inflow rate Fig. 1 Turbine efficiency coefficients versus (a) relative discharge
recorded daily from April 26th, 1989 to April 25th, 2011. and (b) relative effective head for a Francis turbine (NEF 2002) gq:
Variable-discharge turbine efficiency coefficient; gh: Variable-head
The total discharge is defined here as a sum of tail water
turbine efficiency coefficient. Strictly speaking, turbines of different
and spillway discharges. The irrigation season starts on sizes have different optimum ‘‘turbine-specific speeds’’ (Mays 2001),
April 26th every year, so we treated a 1-year period starting which in turn have slightly different variable-discharge efficiency
on this date as a unit of analyses. curves (NEF 2002). However, this study omits such details, and
simply assumes a turbine-specific speed of 104 (m-kW), which is
considered representative within the range of the current investigation
Methods for estimating hydropower generation
potentials
It should be noted that undertaking hydropower gener-
Tail water discharge ation at an irrigation dam throughout 1 year would nor-
mally require specific permission from the river authority
Raw data of total discharge contain only a sum of tail water in Japan. This study simply presumes such permission is
discharge and spillway discharge, so we must distinguish granted, and focuses on the technical aspects of the
the former, which can later be used for hydropower gen- undertaking.
eration. (Spillway discharge can never be used for hydro-
power generation.) In doing this, we simply assume that, if Effective head
the total discharge, Qd, is larger than the designed maxi-
mum tail water discharge, Qmax (Table 1), then the dif- An effective (net) head is the useful energy for the turbine,
ference between Qd and Qmax constitutes a spillway and calculated by subtracting friction energy losses in a
discharge. Thus, tail water discharge is estimated as: penstock and other hydraulic components from the gross
Qt ðiÞ ¼ Qd ðiÞ if Qd ðiÞ\Qmax ðiÞ head, which is the difference between reservoir and tail
ð1Þ water levels (Mays 2001). (Tail water level is a water
Qt ðiÞ ¼ Qmax ðiÞ if Qd ðiÞ Qmax ðiÞ;
surface level of a tailrace into which tail water is dis-
where Qt(i) is the tail water discharge on date i (m3/s), charged through a draft tube (Mays 2001).) Throughout
Qd(i) is the total discharge on date i (m3/s), Qmax(i) is the this study, we assume that the hydropower plant is installed
designed maximum tail water discharge on date i (m3/s). at the outlet of penstock, and friction energy losses are
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Paddy Water Environ
for hydropower
Usable range
he ðiÞ ¼ ½hd ðiÞ h0 0:85; ð2Þ
where he(i) is the effective (net) head on date i (m), hd(i) is Lower limit of
the dam reservoir water level on date i (m), h0 is the tail E
G operable discharge
E’
water level (m).
C
O H B
Turbine selection Days (365 d)
Based on the dataset and Eqs. 1 and 2, possible ranges of Fig. 2 Schematic diagram for the usable range of tail water discharge
for hydropower generation. Tail water discharges are arranged in
tail water discharge and effective head are expected to be
descending order
0.6–7.4 m3/s and 19–48 m, respectively. These are broadly
within the application ranges of a Francis turbine (NEF
2002), one of the most popular turbines for hydropower
plants in Japan. Therefore, a Francis turbine is assumed of tail water discharge is hypothetically set between D–D0
throughout the following analyses. and E–E0 . Accordingly, usable water for power generation
is the area DFGHO, given that a portion of discharge in
Turbine efficiencies under variable discharge and head excess of D–D0 can be bypassed through another pipeline.
Thus, the results in Fig. 2 imply that an identical discharge
The power-generating efficiency of a turbine varies with pattern such as the A–C curve can have different hydro-
discharge and effective head, and a turbine is only capable power generation potentials depending on the scales of a
of operating satisfactorily over limited ranges of discharge turbine. (Note that the scale of a turbine is roughly pro-
and head (US Army Corps of Engineers 1985). Figure 1 portional to its rated discharge; a larger turbine holds
shows the efficiency curves of a Francis turbine (NEF higher lines for D–D0 and E–E0 .)
2002), which can be approximated as: As for the rated effective head her, Fig. 1b shows that
the operable range of effective head extends from 0.5her to
gq ¼ 3:0449 rq4 þ 7:657 rq3 7:4317 rq2 þ 3:628 rq 1.7her with the optimal efficiency attainable in between
þ 0:1711 ð3Þ (i.e., exactly at her). This implies that it is usually ineffi-
2
R ¼ 0:9997; cient to set her equal to the maximum effective head
obtainable at the full reservoir water level, and therefore her
gh ¼ 0:9313 rh4 þ 4:5696 rh3 8:5793 rh2 þ 7:2 rh
1:2577 has to be determined, together with the rated discharge,
ð4Þ
through trial and error to optimize target indicators as
R2 ¼ 0:9998;
discussed later.
Qp he
rq ¼ ; rh ¼ ;
Qr her
Power and energy generated
where gq is the variable-discharge turbine efficiency coef-
ficient, gh is the variable-head turbine efficiency coeffi- Whereas theoretical output (power) generated with a tur-
cient, Qp is the discharge used for power generation (m3/s), bine is the product of discharge by effective head and the
Qr is the rated (maximum) discharge for power generation gravitational acceleration constant, actual output is con-
(m3/s), he is the effective (net) head (m), her is the rated strained by efficiency factors. When a turbine is operated at
effective head (m). the rated discharge Qr and the rated effective head her, a
Figure 1a indicates that the ratio of the lower limit of typical combined efficiency of turbine and dynamo is
operable discharge to the rated discharge is 0.2, and the approximately 0.7 (J-Water 2006). Therefore, an actual
coefficient gq largely becomes smaller as the discharge output generated at a certain discharge Qp and an effective
falls. This has a significant implication for a hydropower head he can be estimated by further incorporating Eqs. 3
plant at an irrigation dam with variable discharges, because and 4 as follows:
only a portion of the tail water discharge can be utilized for P ¼ g Qp he 0:7 gq gh ; ð5Þ
power generation. This is schematically depicted in a dis-
tribution diagram for tail water discharges that are sorted in where P is the electrical output (power) (kW), g is the
a descending order (Fig. 2). In this figure, the usable range gravitational acceleration constant.
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Paddy Water Environ
Summing up the output over a period of 1 year gives the FS ¼ 11:5 E50 0:95; ð10Þ
annual energy production:
where FS is the fossil fuel saving (Yen/y), E50 is the annual
X
365
energy production in a median year (kWh/y), 0.95 is the
E¼ ½PðiÞ 24; ð6Þ
i¼1
plant utilization factor for allowing maintenance breaks.
where CC is the capacity credit (Yen/y), 6,200 is the capital B=C ¼ ðCC þ FSÞ=TC ð15Þ
cost for a displaced fossil fuel power plant (Yen/(kW y)),
P90 is the output that can be maintained over 90 % of the
days during a drought (90 percentile) year (kW).
1
Fossil fuel saving is a direct benefit of generating Exactly speaking, a cost is also necessary to install a new pipeline
that branches off the existing penstock and diverts water to the
electricity with hydropower, because every kWh (energy) hydropower plant, since the plant is assumed to use only a portion of
generated can in principle avoid equivalent fuel uses as the tail water discharge at times. However, we design to construct the
well as associated greenhouse gas emissions at a thermal plant as close as possible to the outlet of penstock, so that the length
power plant. Nonaka and Asano (2011) estimated this of the branch pipe would be minimal. Our rough estimation indicates
that such piping would cost less than a few percent of the power plant
benefit in a Japanese context at around 11.5 (Yen/kWh). construction in total. Therefore we omit it here for simplicity,
We accordingly estimate an annual fossil fuel saving as: although it may be a subject for future studies.
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(a) (a)
(b)
(b)
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The results are shown in Table 2. For the current and costs between the optimum Qr of Qt50 and larger Qr
scheme, the annual energy production is maximized at (say, Qt20), a much smaller cost TC of Qt50 (39,207 thou-
5,982 (MWh/y) with a rated discharge (Qr) of Qt20. In sand Yen/y) more than offsets the corresponding reduction
contrast, the net benefit is maximized at 19,217 (thousand in the gross benefit TB to augment the net benefit NB of
Yen/y) with a smaller Qr of Qt50. Comparing the benefits Qt50. Figure 8 further depicts variations in the daily outputs
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(b) years, because the credit is only given to stable outputs (see
Eq. 9).
800
(c)
capacity credit (Table 2). By contrast, both Scenarios A
and B (Fig. 9b, c) demonstrate relatively narrower mar-
800
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Paddy Water Environ
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