Natel Installs First FishSafe Hydro Turbine with The Monroe Project

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory shows 100% safe fish passage for hydro turbine

Alameda, Calif. — December 10, 2020 — Natel Energy, a supplier of sustainable hydropower solutions, today announced the successful completion of the Monroe Hydro Project with the installation of its 1 MW class D190 Restoration Hydro Turbine (RHT), and 100% safe fish passage test results from the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL).

The Monroe Hydro Project in Madras, Oregon is a first-of-its-kind design making use of an existing irrigation canal and a new FishSafe turbine technology to generate reliable, renewable energy. With the installation of the commercially released 1 MW class D190 RHT, the site will now contribute 100% renewable energy to the local grid. Grant funding from the Department of Energy’s Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO) supported the development of the RHT, and the fish passage testing that was conducted by PNNL. The successful completion of the Monroe Hydro Project and the industry-leading fish passage results extend Natel Energy’s work to make distributed, sustainable hydropower a large scale source of reliable, renewable energy.

“We are thrilled with the successful completion of the Monroe Hydro Project, marking our second commercial installation of Restoration Hydro Turbines,” said Gia Schneider, CEO of Natel Energy. “Ensuring successful fish passage is a fundamental challenge for hydropower developers and operators, and the results of this testing are groundbreaking for low-head deployment. The 100% safe fish passage results achieved in the testing by PNNL marks a new milestone that solidifies the RHT as delivering fish safety without compromising on energy output.”

The RHT is a compact propeller-style turbine with specially designed blades that allow large fish to pass safely. In September 2020, PNNL conducted turbine passage tests that revealed a 100% survival rate for rainbow trout up to 400 mm (15 inches) long passing downstream through the 1.9-meter diameter D190 RHT. Over the course of testing, the gross head at the site was approximately 5.2 meters, and the turbine produced approximately 300 kW electrical output. With the support of the WPTO, PNNL scientists and engineers used Sensor Fish, RFID tag, radio tag, and balloon tag technologies to assess physical turbine stressors and enable the recovery of all fish after their passage through the turbine. Each fish was carefully inspected after passing through the turbine, and no evidence of passage related injuries was observed. This is surprisingly good performance given the compactness of the turbine relative to the large size of fish tested. View the Monroe Fish Passage Testing video.

At less than 2-meters in diameter, the RHT is the most compact turbine that has demonstrated this successful survival rate for large fish. The RHT requires no fine fish screens and minimizes the need for excavation and installation materials, reducing the overall cost to install. In addition, the RHT features a variable-speed direct-drive permanent magnet generator, delivering high efficiency across a wide range of flow rates on a simple and reliable powertrain.

The RHT is suitable for upgrading or repowering existing small hydro plants with modern, high-performance FishSafe turbines; for adding a new generation to existing non-power dams; and for new hydro development through Natel’s Restoration Hydro design approach. Restoration Hydro combines best practices from stream restoration, whitewater recreation, and even dam removals, with modern low-head hydropower technology to create a blueprint for a new generation of water-power-restoration projects. In addition to producing reliable, renewable energy, Natel Energy’s Restoration Hydro projects generate multiple environmental co-benefits that may include habitat creation, improved water quality, and sustained increases in groundwater and aquifer recharge rates. When deployed strategically at multiple sites across a basin, Restoration Hydro projects enhance river, wetland and watershed connectivity, which can help mitigate the impacts of droughts and floods.

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About Natel Energy

Natel Energy is a California-based company with a mission to mitigate climate change and build climate resilience by providing hardware and software solutions that enable a 100% renewable grid via a hydropower backbone. Climate change is water change, and hydropower is situated at the confluence of climate mitigation and adaptation. Hydropower is a crucial component of a low-carbon, renewable grid because of its reliability, flexibility and complementary generation characteristics to wind and solar. Hydropower projects are also integrally dependent upon and have substantial impact on watershed function. Natel’s solutions address cost, operations and environmental performance challenges at the heart of unlocking additional sustainable, reliable hydropower generation – both from the existing fleet and from new project development.