Hydro-turbine technology observation with focus on Francis turbine

Document Type : Review Article

Author

Mechanical Rotary Equipment Research Department, Niroo Research Institute (NRI), Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Hydropower is one of the most cost-effective methods of generating electricity and have the largest share of global renewable electricity generation. Due to the long history of using Hydro-turbines in power generation, the related technologies are at a high level of maturity. However, still many researches are being conducted on this topic to increase efficiency, increase performance flexibility, increase life, and reduce the cost of installing, operating, and maintaining hydro-turbines. In the present work, research papers and inventions related to hydro-turbine technology have been surveyed and based on that, the technical fields that have been focused in recent researches have been identified. Due to the widespread use of Francis turbines in hydropower generation, especially in Iran, the survey is mainly focused to this type of turbine. Accordingly, the most cited technical domains of the Francis turbine include issues related to vortex and flow in draft tube, blades, cavitation, spiral case, computational fluid dynamics, and manufacturing. Also, technologies related to increasing the operating range of hydro-turbines as well as digitalization of hydro-turbine performance are the most important growing technologies related to hydropower generation.

Keywords

Main Subjects


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