Sihwa Lake Tidal Power Station
F2
The tidal power plant Sihwa -ho is a tidal power plant in dam construction on Lake Sihwa ( Kor. 시화호, Sihwa -ho), a manmade lagoon on the coast of South Korea.
With its installed capacity of 254 MW Sihwa -ho since its commissioning in August 2011, the largest tidal power plant in the world; the long-standing record holder La Rance (240 MW) has been relegated to second place.
Location
The power plant is located on the west coast of South Korea in the province of Gyeonggi -do, west of the city Ansan, about 40 km southwest of the capital, Seoul.
It uses the power of the area between the Korean Peninsula and the People's Republic of China Yellow Sea, in the form owing to the large area at a low average depth of only 44 meters high tides. In the Asan Bay, from which the Sihwa lake was separated, the tide is up to 8 m.
In the region at least three other large tidal power plants are planned next to that of Sihwa -ho:
History
The power plant was practically " born out of necessity " because the built by the state water authority Korea Water Resources Corporation between 1987 and 1994 the dam was not originally created for the purpose of energy production but for the land reclamation ( polders) to create a freshwater reservoir for irrigation in agriculture. After the dam completed and thus the bay was separated from the open sea, but water quality deteriorated in the newly created lagoon initiated by urban and industrial effluents rapidly, so that the water for their intended purpose was useless. A then by the Korea Marine Research Institute (Korea Ocean Research and Development Institute - KORDI ) investigation carried out showed that the water quality should improve again, when a stronger water exchange would be given to the open sea.
It was therefore decided in 1997 to create an opening in the perineum, through which the sea water could push it into the basin at high tide. It presented itself - almost as a positive side effect - on to use the tidal currents also for energy and to integrate a power plant. As electricity is but secondary to the ecological function, the power plant was designed only acting for a flow direction: Only the water the ascending tide drives the turbines; at low tide the water is returned energetically ineffective over a barrage with eight shooters back into the sea. Since they represent a lower resistance than the turbine, a greater circulation of water is achieved. Each tidal cycle with approximately one quarter of Seevolumens is replaced.
With the construction of the power plant was started in 2003. Through a temporary retaining wall made of huge concrete cylinders, a section of the sea adjacent to the existing dam was separated and dried out. In the tub thus formed adjacent the locking mechanism and the power plant were built. It was built by the South Korean construction company Daewoo Construction in cooperation with the Austrian VA Tech Hydro.
Parallel to the construction of the power station two islands (the island of the people and the island of nature) were banked on both sides of the plant at the dam, which will be used for tourism, leisure and education.
The completion and commissioning of the power plant was initially planned for late 2009 or early 2010, but was delayed in the course of construction several times. On August 3, 2011, the power plant finally went into commercial operation.
Technical design and data
Reservoir / dam
- Length of the dam: 12.7 km
- Volume of the reservoir lake: 324 million m³
- Surface of the storage lake 56.5 km ²
- Dam: 8 contactors, size 15.3 m × 12 m (open at low tide)
- Seawater flow rate: about 160 million m³ / d (equivalent to about 50 % of the volume of the lake)
- Tidal range about 7.5 m
Power station
- Years working about 550 GWh ( equivalent to the consumption of a town of about ½ million inhabitants )
- Average head 5.82 m
- 10 × turbine 3- bladed Kaplan bulb turbines
- Power 25.4 MW per turbine
- Capacity 482 m³ / s per turbine
- Impeller diameter 7.5 m
- Speed 64.3 min-1
- Voltage 10.2 kV
- 26.76 MVA power
- The frequency is 60 Hz