- #1
mattpbarry
- 9
- 0
Hi all,
Basically I need help working out how much energy we can potentially produce.
We have a waterfall 50m high that has a constant year round flow. We would take off water into a 6" vertical steel pipe at the top and run it to the bottom into a turbine. I don't know the friction of the pipe but can I work this out? Solutions that find the kinetic energy of the water at the bottom is fine as I don't know the conversion rate of a typical micro-hydro turbine either.
I do know that:
If that helps. Thanks in advance. If you need any more data I'll try find it.
Basically I need help working out how much energy we can potentially produce.
We have a waterfall 50m high that has a constant year round flow. We would take off water into a 6" vertical steel pipe at the top and run it to the bottom into a turbine. I don't know the friction of the pipe but can I work this out? Solutions that find the kinetic energy of the water at the bottom is fine as I don't know the conversion rate of a typical micro-hydro turbine either.
I do know that:
Code:
P[SUB]max[/SUB] = Q[SUB]max[/SUB]*H[SUB]max[/SUB]*e[SUB]max[/SUB][SIZE="5"] / K[/SIZE]
Where:
P[SUB]max[/SUB]=Maximum Power Available (kW)
Q[SUB]max[/SUB]=Flow (Volume/time)
H[SUB]max[/SUB]=Head (Vertical drop in m)
e[SUB]max[/SUB]=Efficiency of the turbine (use a value of 1 for max power available)
K=Unit conversion factor (see table below for some common values)
For Q measured in K is equal to
ft3/min 708 (ft4)/(min*kW)
ft3/sec 11.8 (ft4)/(sec*kW)
l/sec 102 (l*ft)/(sec*kW)
gal/min 5302 (gal*ft)/(min*kW)
If that helps. Thanks in advance. If you need any more data I'll try find it.