Hydro's New Era of Opportunity

摘要

The fundamental factors — technical and economic — favoring new hydropower development are the best they've been in 25 years. And, arguably, they're better than in the energy-crisis-response days of the 1980s, a time when hundreds of hydroelectric plants were built. The need is apparent, the hydraulic potential exists, the technology is better-than-ever, and capital is available at low cost. So why are developers not rushing to build hydro plants? While inertia may play a role — not much has been built in the past decade — the No. 1 fly in the ointment is the absence of federal policies that facilitate hydro. In the U.S., licensing of a hydro plant, if successful, routinely has taken ten years.