Monday, December 20, 2010

Pumped-Hydro Energy Storage to be Installed at Portugal’s Venda Nova III

Voith Hydro Heidenheim has been awarded a new order from the Portuguese facility EDP (Energias de Portugal) for two reversible pumped storage units. Voith Hydro, in a consortium with Siemens Portugal, is to supply the complete electromechanical equipment and pumped storage units.

Voith Hydro says that with variable speed capability, the pumped storage units of Venda Nova III will be able to adapt their number of revolutions continuously and take capacities from the grid in the range between 319 and 380MW. Units with fixed speed do not provide this range - their pumping power is regulated with the aid of further units or plants. For the development of wind power, whose supply capacities are intermittent and not precisely predictable, a flexible energy storage system plays a crucial role, the company notes. In combination with variable speed pumped storage, wind power plants become more reliable and more profitable. "Variable speed technology supports direct grid control," says Dr. Siegbert Etter, Executive Vice President Technology of Voith Hydro Holding. "In the era of renewable energies this is the new role pumped storage plants are playing."

Voith Hydro will supply two pumped storage units with variable speed, with 380MW (rated power in turbine mode) each, and two asynchronous motor generators -- with a rated capacity of 420 megavolt ampere -- the frequency converters, the control system and the hydraulic steel structures.

In early 2015, Venda Nova III will be connected to the grid, becoming Portugal’s largest hydroelectric power station. The project includex engineering and civil construction works for nearly 9 kilometers of underground tunnels, a below-ground powerhouse chamber more than 50 meters high, surge and intake shafts, as well as all other related infrastructure.

The country's government plans to develop further 5,400 megawatts of wind power capacity.

1 comment:

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