POWER October 2014 - 59

RENEWABLES
2. Red Rock retrofit. Missouri River Energy Services is in the
process of adding 36.4 MW of hydro generation to the Red Rock Dam
in Iowa. The powerhouse will be located on the near bank below the
dam. Courtesy: MWH
with a total 6.9 GW potential. Not surprisingly, most of the untapped
generation resources were found in the Midwest and Northeast; relatively
little was located in the West.
These numbers are no news to hydropower industry people in
the U.S., many of whom are focusing their development efforts on
smaller retrofits. " There's a recognition recently that there is a lot
of existing infrastructure out there that we can take advantage of, "
Mario Finis, North America energy and industry director and former
global director for hydropower and dams for MWH told POWER in
an interview.
The biggest attraction, naturally, is the reduced cost of development:
With the dam already in place, most of the costs of a comparable
greenfield project have already been incurred. Another bonus of
these smaller projects is that they can provide relatively inexpensive
support for intermittent renewables (see " Small Hydro, Big Opportunity "
in the May 2013 issue).
" There are some interesting interactions between wind and solar
that are helping drive the need for hydro in terms of some of the
ancillary services that hydropower generation can provide. " In this,
Finis said, direct policy support for wind and solar is creating indirect
support for dispatchable generation like hydro. " Investors and
utilities that are taking a more long-term view in terms of generation
resources are looking at hydro as a way to help balance " wind and
solar generation.
Furthermore, while big hydro has gotten the cold shoulder from
state renewable energy portfolios, smaller projects in the neighborhood
of 30 MW can often qualify, Finis said. " There's also a sort of
renewed sensitivity to the smaller projects having less overall impact
on the environment. "
A Promising Niche
One of those smaller retrofit projects is taking shape at the Red Rock
Dam on the Des Moines River in Iowa (Figure 2). The 36.4-MWrated
project, with a peak output of 55 MW, is being built by Missouri
River Energy Services (MRES) for the Western Minnesota Municipal
Power Agency (WMMPA). MWH is supplying engineering and
consulting services, and Voith Hydro is supplying the generators and
turbines. Ground was broken on the Red Rock Hydroelectric Project
(RRHP) in August, with completion scheduled for 2018. The $379
million facility will be operated by MRES and financed and owned
by WMMPA.
While there are avoided costs involved with a retrofit as comOctober
2014 | POWER
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POWER October 2014

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