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What does "hydropower" include on SMARD?
Water is used with various forms of technology to generate electricity. Two of these are combined as "hydropower" under actual generation on SMARD.
On SMARD, electricity generated by run-of-river hydroelectricity plants and hydro storage plants is combined as "hydropower" and classed as renewable energy. One reason for this is something the two types of plant have in common: they are fed only by a natural water intake, which makes them weather-dependent. Simply put, run-of-river plants use the elevation difference in rivers and streams to power a turbine using the flow of water and thereby generate electricity.
Hydro storage plants are also filled using a natural intake alone and may be dams. Water can be released from a reservoir to power turbines and generate electricity.
The difference to pumped storage is that, in pumped storage plants, electricity is used to actively pump water into an upper reservoir and this water is later let out again.
The amount of electricity generated by run-of-river and hydro storage plants is only a small proportion of the total generation, so SMARD has combined the two.