3 ms·
Suitable locations for pumped hydro are very limited, it is a comparably rare resource. A lot of mountainous places are dry, and a lot of wet places are flat.
by inglor_cz 1y ago
Suitable locations for pumped hydro are very limited, it is a comparably rare resource.
A lot of mountainous places are dry, and a lot of wet places are flat.
Of the remaining places, some are so unique that they cannot be destroyed by industrial construction (National Parks etc.)
For example, the main ridge of Krkonoše (Riesengebirge) on the Polish-Czech border has a lot of wind and rain and deep valleys, but it is the only place south of Scandinavia with a Scandinavia-like tundra and many endemites surviving from the last Ice Age. Any attempt to construct pumped hydro there would result in a national uproar on both sides of the border.
- pfdietz 1y agoSuitable locations for on river pumped hydro are limited. But off river? The possibilities are vast.
- bryanlarsen 1y agoPumped hydro just requires a lake at the bottom of a slope. Unlike hydro generation, it doesn't require flow. Here's almost a million locations suitable for pumped hydro: https://re100.eng.anu.edu.au/global/ https://re100.eng.anu.edu.au/global/
- defrost 1y agoTwo farm dams at a minimum, one at either end of a slope. You can serve a small town of 500 or so people (plus tourists) with a mini systems for ~ $8 million (AU) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45332157 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45332157
- bryanlarsen 1y agoAnd that location probably wasn't on the ANU map, meaning there were are far more than 1 million suitable locations.