Solar panels and wind turbines get a lot of attention in the current conversation about renewable energy. Meanwhile, hydropower is quietly, consistently producing large amounts of clean energy—and has been for more than a century. In fact, nearly 27% of all current renewable energy generation in the United States comes from hydroelectric operations.
But in order for hydropower to continue contributing to the nation's clean energy goals, a strong domestic supply chain must be put in place to enable new construction, plant upgrades, and refurbishments to aging systems.
Shoring up that supply chain is the focus of a recently released report, titled "Hydropower Supply Chain Gap Analysis," which considers various sectors of the hydropower supply chain—from mining and extraction to installation and construction. The report identifies five key gaps in the domestic supply chain and provides actionable recommendations for addressing them.
"There are a number of actionable items that the report identified that we can continue to work on, like building the hydropower workforce and aggregating hydro's needs with other renewable energy industries," said Tessa Greco, an author of the report and group manager of the Water Power Deployment and Commercialization team at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
"If we take steps to corral our federal resources and acknowledge where policy and regulatory improvements might be possible, we can enable more domestic manufacturing capability."
