World’s largest form of renewable power contributes to 15.9 per cent of global electricity, with China home to planet’s largest hydropower plant
Sarawak, Malaysia’s largest state, plans to harness hydropower not only for its energy-generating potential but also to create about 3,500 jobs
Asia: It’s tempting to imagine hydropower as a relatively modern phenomenon – born in the 1950s and really taking root only in the 21st century.
Yet, that would ignore the fact that humans have been harnessing the power of water for well over 2,000 years, ever since the ancient Greeks used running streams to move wheels for the purposes of grinding grain.
Fast-forward two millenniums and it has become one of the most efficient and cost-effective ways of generating electricity.
The world still has a long way to go before realising the dream of universal, clean energy.
Bob Dudley, BP’s group chief executive, said in the company’s Statistical Review of World Energy Report 2019 that although renewable energy is growing far more rapidly than any other form of power, it still supplies only a third of the required increase in power generation – about the same amount as coal.
Of that renewable energy, it’s often sources such as solar power that generate the most headlines. But the truth is that hydroelectricity is the world’s largest form of renewable power, contributing to 15.9 per cent of global electricity – more than the combined contribution of all other forms of renewable energy.
Hydropower’s increased importance to the global energy grid comes at an important juncture in human history; the UN’s 2015 Paris Accords and Sustainable Development Goals both highlighted how imperative it is for the world to move from fossil fuels to sustainable sources of energy to minimise the rise of global temperatures and cut mankind’s impact on the planet and its climate.
This clarion call has been heard around the world. In Norway, 99 per cent of all electricity is generated by hydropower, while in Canada, six out of every 10 homes are powered by hydroelectricity, which has also created thousands of jobs in the country.
Uruguay has reached almost 100 per cent renewable energy, thanks largely to hydropower.
Asia wakes up to hydropower
However, it’s in Asia where hydropower’s potential is truly being unleashed.
China, with 352 gigawatts in 2018, is the world leader in terms of installed capacity – far ahead of second and third-placed Brazil and the US, which both have just over 100GW of installed capacity.
Other Asian nations such as Japan, India and Vietnam also rank among the top nations in the world for hydropower capacity.
“Four years on since the Sustainable Development Goals were agreed at the United Nations in 2015, governments increasingly recognise hydropower as playing a vital role in national strategies for delivering affordable and clean energy, managing fresh water, combating climate change and improving livelihoods,” Richard Taylor and Ken Adams, the International Hydropower Association’s chief executive and president, respectively, said in the Hydropower Status Report 2019.
“Hydropower development today is most active in fast-growing economies and emerging markets, with the East Asia and the Pacific region, followed by South America, adding the highest additional capacity last year.”
Overall, Asia alone accounted for 42 per cent – or 543GW – of the world’s total installed capacity of 1,295GW last year.
World’s largest hydropower plant
Asia is also home to the world’s largest hydropower plant, China’s Three Gorges Dam – which spans the middle reaches of the Yangtze River in Yichang, Hubei province – which produces 90 to 100 terawatt hours (TWH) per year – enough energy to power 80 million households.
The power generated by this one dam is more than the overall capacity of Pakistan and Vietnam, Asia’s fourth and fifth-largest generators of hydropower.
Hydropower Status Report 2019
Vietnam has been leading the charge in Southeast Asia, a region which has more than doubled its hydropower capacity, from 16GW to 44GW, between 2000 and 2016.
Laos, Vietnam’s landlocked and impoverished neighbour, has a theoretical potential of 18,000 megawatts of hydropower and intends to double the 46 operating hydroelectric plants it has by next year.
Hydropower is essential to the country’s economy, accounting for 30 per cent of Laos’ exports and earning it the moniker “The Battery of Southeast Asia”.
On the whole, the availability of hydropower is a boon to Asia and the Pacific, which is home to more than 4.4 billion people who account for more than half the world’s energy consumption – 85 per cent of which is in the form of fossil fuels.
While industrialisation and urbanisation is growing at a rapid pace, the reality is that more than 10 per cent of this area’s huge population still lacks access to electricity – a clear hindrance to the region being able to improve the incomes and lives of its residents.
With affordability a core concern, hydropower makes even more sense because it is one of the cheapest energy sources available today.
Mitigating hydropower’s impact on environment
Over the years, hydropower has been criticised for reportedly coming at too high a cost to the environment, native fauna and indigenous populations.
Potential consequences of hydropower projects, which have been identified by the International Hydropower Association (IHA), include “changes in environmental quality; and changes in quality of life for directly affected people”.
Renewables will have the fastest growth in the electricity sector, providing almost 30 per cent of power demand in 2023, and are forecast to meet more than 70 per cent of global electricity generation growth:
To address these environmental and social impacts, the IHA, in partnership with the Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Council formed by social and environmental NGOs, financial institutions, governments and hydropower companies – including Sarawak Energy, the WWF, Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs and World Bank – launched the Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Protocol.
This comprises guidelines and international industry practices to make hydropower more environmentally benign and less harmful to local communities.
In 2017, the International Finance Corporation also published the Environmental, Health, and Safety Approaches for Hydropower Projects – part of its Good Practice Series – which provides principles to effectively anticipate, avoid and minimise the environmental risks and impact of hydropower development.
Benefits of Sarawak project
A good example of how hydropower can provide more than just affordable, renewable electricity can be found in Malaysia’s largest state of Sarawak.
Its waterways, which include more than 55 navigable rivers with a combined length exceeding 3,300km (2,050 miles), serve as vital arteries; in some places these rivers form the only means of transport.
Yet Sarawak depends on these rivers not only for transport but also to provide renewable energy that complements the state’s thermal energy from gas and coal projects.
Batang Ai, for example, the state’s first hydroelectric plant, started operating in 1985 and is still going strong today. The plant, along with the dams of Murum and Bakun – the nation’s largest hydroelectricity dam – provide the state with 3,452MW of power.
Meanwhile, the Baleh Hydroelectric Project, 95km from the confluence of the Baleh and Rajang rivers, has already kicked off. It is one of the largest projects being developed by the state’s energy company, Sarawak Energy.
When completed in 2026, the 188-metre (615-foot)-high dam will add 1,285MW of renewable energy to the state’s grid.
Dam means more power – and jobs
However, the dam will be important not only for its energy-generating potential but also for creating about 3,500 jobs.
Sarawak Energy is working closely with the indigenous Kapit community to ensure locals enjoy the bulk of the benefits of the project.
The energy company is sponsoring technical training for 500 young people to provide them with the necessary skills and the opportunity to work for the dam contractors.
Malaysia’s Sarawak Energy is working closely with the indigenous Kapit community to ensure locals in Sarawak enjoy the bulk of the benefits of the Baleh Hydroelectric Project
It’s tempting to imagine hydropower as a relatively modern phenomenon – born in the 1950s and really taking root only in the 21st century.
Yet, that would ignore the fact that humans have been harnessing the power of water for well over 2,000 years, ever since the ancient Greeks used running streams to move wheels for the purposes of grinding grain.
Fast-forward two millenniums and it has become one of the most efficient and cost-effective ways of generating electricity.
The world still has a long way to go before realising the dream of universal, clean energy.
Bob Dudley, BP’s group chief executive, said in the company’s Statistical Review of World Energy Report 2019 that although renewable energy is growing far more rapidly than any other form of power, it still supplies only a third of the required increase in power generation – about the same amount as coal.
Of that renewable energy, it’s often sources such as solar power that generate the most headlines. But the truth is that hydroelectricity is the world’s largest form of renewable power, contributing to 15.9 per cent of global electricity – more than the combined contribution of all other forms of renewable energy.
Put another way, if the energy generated by hydropower was replaced by coal, it would result in an extra 4 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases every year.
Hydropower’s increased importance to the global energy grid comes at an important juncture in human history; the UN’s 2015 Paris Accords and Sustainable Development Goals both highlighted how imperative it is for the world to move from fossil fuels to sustainable sources of energy to minimise the rise of global temperatures and cut mankind’s impact on the planet and its climate.
This clarion call has been heard around the world. In Norway, 99 per cent of all electricity is generated by hydropower, while in Canada, six out of every 10 homes are powered by hydroelectricity, which has also created thousands of jobs in the country.
Uruguay has reached almost 100 per cent renewable energy, thanks largely to hydropower.
Asia wakes up to hydropower
However, it’s in Asia where hydropower’s potential is truly being unleashed.
China, with 352 gigawatts in 2018, is the world leader in terms of installed capacity – far ahead of second and third-placed Brazil and the US, which both have just over 100GW of installed capacity.
Other Asian nations such as Japan, India and Vietnam also rank among the top nations in the world for hydropower capacity.
“Four years on since the Sustainable Development Goals were agreed at the United Nations in 2015, governments increasingly recognise hydropower as playing a vital role in national strategies for delivering affordable and clean energy, managing fresh water, combating climate change and improving livelihoods,” Richard Taylor and Ken Adams, the International Hydropower Association’s chief executive and president, respectively, said in the Hydropower Status Report 2019.
“Hydropower development today is most active in fast-growing economies and emerging markets, with the East Asia and the Pacific region, followed by South America, adding the highest additional capacity last year.”
Overall, Asia alone accounted for 42 per cent – or 543GW – of the world’s total installed capacity of 1,295GW last year.
World’s largest hydropower plant
Asia is also home to the world’s largest hydropower plant, China’s Three Gorges Dam – which spans the middle reaches of the Yangtze River in Yichang, Hubei province – which produces 90 to 100 terawatt hours (TWH) per year – enough energy to power 80 million households.
The power generated by this one dam is more than the overall capacity of Pakistan and Vietnam, Asia’s fourth and fifth-largest generators of hydropower.
Hydropower development today is most active in fast-growing economies and emerging markets, with the East Asia and the Pacific region, followed by South America, adding the highest additional capacity in 2018
Laos, Vietnam’s landlocked and impoverished neighbour, has a theoretical potential of 18,000 megawatts of hydropower and intends to double the 46 operating hydroelectric plants it has by next year.
Hydropower is essential to the country’s economy, accounting for 30 per cent of Laos’ exports and earning it the moniker “The Battery of Southeast Asia”.
On the whole, the availability of hydropower is a boon to Asia and the Pacific, which is home to more than 4.4 billion people who account for more than half the world’s energy consumption – 85 per cent of which is in the form of fossil fuels.
While industrialisation and urbanisation is growing at a rapid pace, the reality is that more than 10 per cent of this area’s huge population still lacks access to electricity – a clear hindrance to the region being able to improve the incomes and lives of its residents.
With affordability a core concern, hydropower makes even more sense because it is one of the cheapest energy sources available today.
Mitigating hydropower’s impact on environment
Over the years, hydropower has been criticised for reportedly coming at too high a cost to the environment, native fauna and indigenous populations.
Potential consequences of hydropower projects, which have been identified by the International Hydropower Association (IHA), include “changes in environmental quality; and changes in quality of life for directly affected people”.
Renewables will have the fastest growth in the electricity sector, providing almost 30 per cent of power demand in 2023, and are forecast to meet more than 70 per cent of global electricity generation growth
This comprises guidelines and international industry practices to make hydropower more environmentally benign and less harmful to local communities.
In 2017, the International Finance Corporation also published the Environmental, Health, and Safety Approaches for Hydropower Projects – part of its Good Practice Series – which provides principles to effectively anticipate, avoid and minimise the environmental risks and impact of hydropower development.
Benefits of Sarawak project
A good example of how hydropower can provide more than just affordable, renewable electricity can be found in Malaysia’s largest state of Sarawak.
Its waterways, which include more than 55 navigable rivers with a combined length exceeding 3,300km (2,050 miles), serve as vital arteries; in some places these rivers form the only means of transport.
Yet Sarawak depends on these rivers not only for transport but also to provide renewable energy that complements the state’s thermal energy from gas and coal projects.
Batang Ai, for example, the state’s first hydroelectric plant, started operating in 1985 and is still going strong today. The plant, along with the dams of Murum and Bakun – the nation’s largest hydroelectricity dam – provide the state with 3,452MW of power.
Meanwhile, the Baleh Hydroelectric Project, 95km from the confluence of the Baleh and Rajang rivers, has already kicked off. It is one of the largest projects being developed by the state’s energy company, Sarawak Energy.
When completed in 2026, the 188-metre (615-foot)-high dam will add 1,285MW of renewable energy to the state’s grid.
Dam means more power – and jobs
However, the dam will be important not only for its energy-generating potential but also for creating about 3,500 jobs.
Sarawak Energy is working closely with the indigenous Kapit community to ensure locals enjoy the bulk of the benefits of the project.
The energy company is sponsoring technical training for 500 young people to provide them with the necessary skills and the opportunity to work for the dam contractors.
Up to 100 million Malaysian ringgit (US$24 million) has also been set aside to build a power line to supply electricity to villages around the state constituency of Baleh.
The 3,500 jobs created by the project form part of a global hydropower economy which is creating jobs for more than 1.8 million people – and that does not include those working in the supply chains associated with hydropower.
Another benefit is how the storage structures of hydroelectricity reservoirs mitigate the risks posed by floods or droughts by controlling the flow of water downstream. They also help to manage fresh water supplies to homes, businesses and agriculture.
Positive side to hydropower
Thanks to its storage technology and the benefits it brings in integrating other renewables and balancing grids, hydropower is a key enabler of global energy transition from fossil to renewable fuels.
With ambitious renewable energy targets, countries around the globe are increasingly reliant on sources such as wind and solar. But power must be available when the wind is not blowing or the sun fails to shine.
It’s tempting to imagine hydropower as a relatively modern phenomenon – born in the 1950s and really taking root only in the 21st century.
Yet, that would ignore the fact that humans have been harnessing the power of water for well over 2,000 years, ever since the ancient Greeks used running streams to move wheels for the purposes of grinding grain.
Fast-forward two millenniums and it has become one of the most efficient and cost-effective ways of generating electricity.
The world still has a long way to go before realising the dream of universal, clean energy.
Bob Dudley, BP’s group chief executive, said in the company’s Statistical Review of World Energy Report 2019 that although renewable energy is growing far more rapidly than any other form of power, it still supplies only a third of the required increase in power generation – about the same amount as coal.
Governments increasingly recognise hydropower as playing a vital role in national strategies for delivering affordable and clean energy, managing fresh water, combating climate change and improving livelihoods
Of that renewable energy, it’s often sources such as solar power that generate the most headlines. But the truth is that hydroelectricity is the world’s largest form of renewable power, contributing to 15.9 per cent of global electricity – more than the combined contribution of all other forms of renewable energy.
Put another way, if the energy generated by hydropower was replaced by coal, it would result in an extra 4 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases every year.
Hydropower’s increased importance to the global energy grid comes at an important juncture in human history; the UN’s 2015 Paris Accords and Sustainable Development Goals both highlighted how imperative it is for the world to move from fossil fuels to sustainable sources of energy to minimise the rise of global temperatures and cut mankind’s impact on the planet and its climate.
This clarion call has been heard around the world. In Norway, 99 per cent of all electricity is generated by hydropower, while in Canada, six out of every 10 homes are powered by hydroelectricity, which has also created thousands of jobs in the country.
Uruguay has reached almost 100 per cent renewable energy, thanks largely to hydropower.
Asia wakes up to hydropower
However, it’s in Asia where hydropower’s potential is truly being unleashed.
China, with 352 gigawatts in 2018, is the world leader in terms of installed capacity – far ahead of second and third-placed Brazil and the US, which both have just over 100GW of installed capacity.
Other Asian nations such as Japan, India and Vietnam also rank among the top nations in the world for hydropower capacity.
“Four years on since the Sustainable Development Goals were agreed at the United Nations in 2015, governments increasingly recognise hydropower as playing a vital role in national strategies for delivering affordable and clean energy, managing fresh water, combating climate change and improving livelihoods,” Richard Taylor and Ken Adams, the International Hydropower Association’s chief executive and president, respectively, said in the Hydropower Status Report 2019.
“Hydropower development today is most active in fast-growing economies and emerging markets, with the East Asia and the Pacific region, followed by South America, adding the highest additional capacity last year.”
Overall, Asia alone accounted for 42 per cent – or 543GW – of the world’s total installed capacity of 1,295GW last year.
World’s largest hydropower plant
Asia is also home to the world’s largest hydropower plant, China’s Three Gorges Dam – which spans the middle reaches of the Yangtze River in Yichang, Hubei province – which produces 90 to 100 terawatt hours (TWH) per year – enough energy to power 80 million households.
The power generated by this one dam is more than the overall capacity of Pakistan and Vietnam, Asia’s fourth and fifth-largest generators of hydropower.
Hydropower development today is most active in fast-growing economies and emerging markets, with the East Asia and the Pacific region, followed by South America, adding the highest additional capacity in 2018
Laos, Vietnam’s landlocked and impoverished neighbour, has a theoretical potential of 18,000 megawatts of hydropower and intends to double the 46 operating hydroelectric plants it has by next year.
Hydropower is essential to the country’s economy, accounting for 30 per cent of Laos’ exports and earning it the moniker “The Battery of Southeast Asia”.
On the whole, the availability of hydropower is a boon to Asia and the Pacific, which is home to more than 4.4 billion people who account for more than half the world’s energy consumption – 85 per cent of which is in the form of fossil fuels.
While industrialisation and urbanisation is growing at a rapid pace, the reality is that more than 10 per cent of this area’s huge population still lacks access to electricity – a clear hindrance to the region being able to improve the incomes and lives of its residents.
With affordability a core concern, hydropower makes even more sense because it is one of the cheapest energy sources available today.
Mitigating hydropower’s impact on environment
Over the years, hydropower has been criticised for reportedly coming at too high a cost to the environment, native fauna and indigenous populations.
Potential consequences of hydropower projects, which have been identified by the International Hydropower Association (IHA), include “changes in environmental quality; and changes in quality of life for directly affected people”.
This comprises guidelines and international industry practices to make hydropower more environmentally benign and less harmful to local communities.
In 2017, the International Finance Corporation also published the Environmental, Health, and Safety Approaches for Hydropower Projects – part of its Good Practice Series – which provides principles to effectively anticipate, avoid and minimise the environmental risks and impact of hydropower development.
Benefits of Sarawak project
A good example of how hydropower can provide more than just affordable, renewable electricity can be found in Malaysia’s largest state of Sarawak.
Its waterways, which include more than 55 navigable rivers with a combined length exceeding 3,300km (2,050 miles), serve as vital arteries; in some places these rivers form the only means of transport.
Yet Sarawak depends on these rivers not only for transport but also to provide renewable energy that complements the state’s thermal energy from gas and coal projects.
Batang Ai, for example, the state’s first hydroelectric plant, started operating in 1985 and is still going strong today. The plant, along with the dams of Murum and Bakun – the nation’s largest hydroelectricity dam – provide the state with 3,452MW of power.
Meanwhile, the Baleh Hydroelectric Project, 95km from the confluence of the Baleh and Rajang rivers, has already kicked off. It is one of the largest projects being developed by the state’s energy company, Sarawak Energy.
When completed in 2026, the 188-metre (615-foot)-high dam will add 1,285MW of renewable energy to the state’s grid.
Dam means more power – and jobs
However, the dam will be important not only for its energy-generating potential but also for creating about 3,500 jobs.
Sarawak Energy is working closely with the indigenous Kapit community to ensure locals enjoy the bulk of the benefits of the project.
The energy company is sponsoring technical training for 500 young people to provide them with the necessary skills and the opportunity to work for the dam contractors.
Up to 100 million Malaysian ringgit (US$24 million) has also been set aside to build a power line to supply electricity to villages around the state constituency of Baleh.
What is happening in Baleh illustrates why it’s simplistic to view the benefits of hydropower only in terms of renewable, reliable and affordable energy.
The 3,500 jobs created by the project form part of a global hydropower economy which is creating jobs for more than 1.8 million people – and that does not include those working in the supply chains associated with hydropower.
Another benefit is how the storage structures of hydroelectricity reservoirs mitigate the risks posed by floods or droughts by controlling the flow of water downstream. They also help to manage fresh water supplies to homes, businesses and agriculture.
Positive side to hydropower
Thanks to its storage technology and the benefits it brings in integrating other renewables and balancing grids, hydropower is a key enabler of global energy transition from fossil to renewable fuels.
With ambitious renewable energy targets, countries around the globe are increasingly reliant on sources such as wind and solar. But power must be available when the wind is not blowing or the sun fails to shine.
When production is greater than needed, stored excess energy can help to increase overall profitability.
However, effectively managing the intermittent nature of renewable power requires flexible solutions. Hydro power and storage form part of this scheme.
More than 10 per cent of hydro-installed bases provide hydro storage, making it possible to store great quantities of immediately available potential electricity, provide greater flexibility and stability to the energy network, and enable the evolution of other forms of renewable energy.
“Renewables will have the fastest growth in the electricity sector, providing almost 30 per cent of power demand in 2023, and are forecast to meet more than 70 per cent of global electricity generation growth,” the International Energy Agency says.
Hydropower will be a key enabler of this growth.
Sarawak Energy
Source: South China Morning Post
