Hydro planning in Puget Sound

[thane]

Hello, My name is Thane.

My wife and I rescued this 40 acres from a developer who was about to divide it into 5 acre parcels. It's West of Seattle in the Puget Sound.  Our plan is to build a high efficiency home and use solar (pv and thermal), wind and hydro ...plus there's no lack of firewood.  

MAP LEGEND

A)  Seasonal stream runs ~6 months

B)  Pond fed by spring, ~500,000 gallons (200'x30'x15'deep), refills at 2-4 gpm all year

C)  4 acre lake

1. 6" PVC drain, 18' below surface of pond, also has 2" drain running down to lake
   
2. Proposed turbine location
   
3. Building site
   
   

Distances...  1-2 is 300 feet...  2-3 is 700 feet... Head is about 100 feet

Red dashed line is a proposed culvert to augment the gpm refill of the pond (need more flow data).  The stream is seasonal, so it is not regulated and I can divert the entire flow if needed.

My hydro questions and thoughts:

About how many gross watts do I have?  What would the optimum penstock pipe size be? Is it reasonable to think of an "on demand hydro" for 220v appliances by opening and closing turbine valve?  Or, do you get the same energy by just charging batteries?  Have any of you seen a 2 turbine system that you switch between for high use and low use? I have access to big power cable for the 700' run to the house.  I want to squeeze all I can out of that pond without draining it too often.  What other stupid questions should I be asking. ;-)  

Here is a 3D view looking Southeast...

[chainsaw]

The first and most important thing is to determine your gal/min and an accurate measure of the head. Next determine the distance of your penstock and then you can calcuate your amount of head loss for the different size penstock and then you can begin to determine watts available for your site.

Hydro which is very similar to a battery, you only have so much energy available so how fast you take the amps or gallons will still have to be replaced.

My personal opinion is that you would be more satified with a steady output from your hydro rather than draining the pond for excessive production for short periods of time. Especially if you are going to have a battery bank with your other RE.

With your approx 100 ft. of head and a steady flow you have a resource well worth using, but you must calculate wire expense, penstock distance plus a generator of some type to determine your feasibilty.

I have a small hydro in a small stream and I control my seasonal flow changes with different nozzel sizes. No matter the flow I am always putting a little juice into the batteries.

Bill

[tecker]

Good work on the land hang in there . The Hydro seems like a little bit of a gamble .The wind at that location should lend itself to most of your needs while Freezing temps would require some monitoring and maintenance.    

[WindHarvester]

Sounds like a fun project and alot of work! Do you have any photos of your land? Would love to see the scenery.

Merry Christmas!

Lonnie

[thane]

Wow, I didn't expect responses so fast!

I will be gathering accurate measurements over the next year before buying hardware.

I realize that I have a limited reserve of water, but with a half a million gallons on tap and the ability to refill from rain surges (it rains a little bit in Puget Sound), I really don't want to be be spinning the turbine when the batteries are fully charged.  I'm thinking a valve could be controlled by monitoring battery levels and open the valve when below a certain percent. Especially since I will be augmenting PV and Wind.

There is already a 2" pvc penstock in place, as the pond was a historically a drinking water supply for the area below us (pre-1980).

Even with all the advance calculating, I think I may have to learn the hard way.

For now I will go with 100' of head, 300' of 2" pvc penstock and 4 gpm (without diverting the stream).

I am a "professional scrounger" and can come up with any size wire I may need for the 700 foot run.

I can count the number of nights below freezing on one hand. This area gets prevailing winds off of the Pacific and is very mild.

Here's some photos...

http://www.auctionadvisory.com/eaton.htm

http://www.auctionadvisory.com/eaton1.htm

[thane]

Here is a video of the 6" drain. 7MB... not for dialup.

http://www.auctionadvisory.com/pondvalve.AVI

I ran that valve full open for an hour and only took about 2 inches of the pond.

[spinningmagnets]

I don't have a hydro site, but I hope to have one someday.

I like the idea you have of using two turbines, one sized for steady regular flows, and a second to take advantage of spring snow-melt and storms.

It sounds like you already know high-voltage AC travels distance better, then rectify at the controller into DC.

From my homework, I figure hydro (for those who have it) is the best, wind is great, and is the next best investment (a small one to learn on, then the largest you can manage so as to gather energy often in low winds). PV seems expensive compared to the other two, but its a great addition.

You should plan on back-up power, I recommend a Diesel-gen (which can easily be modified to run on vegetable oil).

This site and "builditsolar.com" are by far the two best for these kinds of subjects.

"That boy, I say, that boy couldn't pour water out of a boot if the instructions were on the heel" -Foghorn Leghorn

[hydrosun]

Your 4gpm at 100 feet head would put out 40 watts. The most practical use would be to generate dc and charge batteries. The batteries would be able to store the energy from solar and 24 hour hydro. When you have larger flows from the stream after rains you could use more or larger nozzles to produce more power. The battery based system gives you much more flexibility to use the wide range of flows and various sources of power.

 The 700 feet of wire can be kept smaller by using higher voltages, a 48 volt battery bank. DCto DC converter allows even higher voltages.

 The pond gives you a great way to even out the varying higher flows in the winter. But it is amazing how much water goes through a hydro in a 24 hour period. Over 1400 gallons for just 1 gpm . I'm not sure how many feet of storage from the pond you actually can use.

 I live north of Seattle near Bellingham. When you say you live west of Seattle, my first thought was you were in Puget Sound, then I realized you must be on the Olympic Peninsula.

Chris

[thane]

Thanks Chris.

I can use almost all of the pond, since the drain is close to the bottom, but my wife doesn't like that idea.

I will have plenty of time to monitor flows.  Maybe with the stream, I can up the average flow to 50 gpm or more.

[ebby1234]

Hi Thane

Look on my website it will give you some info for water turbines

[Ungrounded Lightning Rod]

My wife and I were looking at the map of the area and noticed a Thousand Trails road just to your northwest.  That usually indicates a campground that's part of the chain.  Is it still open?

(We have a membership and also some friends a day's drive away that we might visit someday.)

[hydrosun]

Using a flow of 50 gpm would have a pressure loss of about 15 feet head with your 2 inch pipe. That would give you about 450 watts. You wouldn't gain much more power trying to put more water through that pipe. If you find you can use 100 gpm I'd recommend upgrading the pipe to a 4 inch gasketed sewer pipe. I've use that pipe up to 110 psi. I use pvc glue on the gaskets to hold the pipe together. It's the cheapest large pipe I've found. Using 100 gpm would max out the Harris Hydro at about 1000 watts. By using 4 nozzles you could vary the flow from 4 to 100 gpm quite easily.

 I use the Outback Mx-60 to drop the hydro voltage down to the battery voltage and at the same time it adjusts the speed of the hydro to match the volume of water without having to physically adjust the magnets on the hydro. The Mx-60 has to have solar panels also hooked up to keep the voltage from the hydro from going over 140 volts and wrecking the Mx-60. I had one unit that had worked for the last 3 years and I made the mistake of turning on all the nozzles quickly while it was dark and the MX-60 went to sleep and couldn't handle the inrush current. I took it to Outback yesterday and was back out the door with  a new unit within 20 minutes. Using it on hydro is still experimental but it has many advantages.  And Outback seemed happy to fix any problem I've had. It helps that the owner also has a hydro using this setup.

With a hydro output of 1000 watts I can use an air  ductless heatpump to keep our house above 70F until it gets  below freezing. My next project is to add a water to air heat exchanger in front of the heat pump which should keep it from having to go through it's defrost cycle. Usually when it get's really cold my stream flow slows down and I don't have enough energy to keep the heatpump running.

Chris

[thane]

There was a plan to put in a campground there, but someone else bought the 80 acres. We look directly at it from our ridge.  The whole area was kind of a weekend warrior camp, but now larger parcels are beeing bought for people to retire on, so prices are on the rise.

[thane]

being... there are hives though ;-)

[boB]

So, how about how many GPM is that ?

BEAUTIFUL piece of land you got there !!

And did I see some kind of old wind pumping wind turbine leaning

up against the trees in one of those pictures

>>Here is a video of the 6" drain. 7MB... not for dialup.

>>http://www.auctionadvisory.com/pondvalve.AVI

>>I ran that valve full open for an hour and only took about 2 inches of the pond.

[thane]

My guess is about 130 to 150 GPM. But, that pond would be gone about 2.5 days at that rate.

That windmill is on a freestanding tripod of timbers, but the previous owner let the trees grow up around it.  It's down by the 4 acre lake.

[Boss]

Very pretty property

Interesting info on the gpm & wattage relationship. Nice looking site on renewable energy too.

[elvin1949]

Tecker

 Freezing should not be a big problem.

At a higher altitude yes but not there where

he is.  haven't lived there for over 30 yr's,

just what i remember.

later

Elvin