As Governor Brown and other leaders continue to speak about climate change to push their cap-and-trade in the 2021 session, Portland General Electric counters the need for cap-and-trade with new renewable energy.

PGE has announced a new hydroelectric project powered entirely by excess water pressure. Traditional hydroelectric projects are nothing new across the state, and PGE owns or partially owns seven hydro facilities on the Clackamas, Willamette, and Deschutes Rivers. The City of Hillsboro is pioneering an innovative micro-hydropower system called the In-PRV that manages pressure in a city water pipeline while generating renewable energy, reducing carbon, saving water, extending the life of infrastructure and improving resilience.

“The major difference” says PGE, “comes from how the system is being integrated into the city of Hillsboro’s existing hydro infrastructure. Instead of the roaring falls at the Bonneville Dam, this new technology captures the waste pressure produced inside the pipe from the constant flow of water – using a new kind of pressure reducing valve to harness that wasted energy and turn it into reliable, renewable electricity. And unlike many other forms that are dependent upon weather, the flow at this system runs 24/7, allowing additional resiliency for the grid.”

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Located just outside of the Hillsboro Hops stadium, the approximately 200,000 kWh generated annually from this site will add to PGE’s Renewable Development Fund’s growing portfolio of over 14.5 MW of installed renewable projects.

If the state didn’t require new energy projects to include expensive sources of wind and solar, these new innovations could reduce energy cost while effectively reducing the impact on climate change.




--Donna Bleiler

Post Date: 2020-11-22 16:36:43

Last Update: 2020-11-23 15:43:35