Glacier power station

A glacier power plant is a hydroelectric power plant that uses melt water from a glacier to generate electricity. The construction of glacial power plants can only be carried out in polar regions . The melt water is available in very large quantities at useful heights between 1,000 and 3,000 m.

Thus, glacier power plants are among the high-pressure systems . In order to be able to use the water, the deepest point of a glacial lake is drilled and the meltwater is piped to the machine house . Due to the water anomaly, a lake freezes over from top to bottom in winter. This fact makes it possible to continuously drain water from the bottom of the lake to the power plant. Problems can arise from the sand and gravel carried along, which damage the system components. In addition, due to the extreme climatic conditions, high demands must be placed on the structure, material and crew when realizing such structures.

literature

• Jürgen Giesecke, Emil Mosonyi, Stephan Heimerl: hydropower plants, planning, construction and operation . 6th edition. Springer, 2014, ISBN 978-3-642-53871-1 .