Central TX Hydropower Resource, Never Huge Part Of Mix, Now Even Smaller In Drought
The yearslong drought in Central Texas could eventually snuff out a renewable power source that fueled the region’s early growth: hydropower. Faced with dwindling water supplies, the Lower Colorado River Authority, which supplies water and energy to much of Central Texas, is limiting downstream water releases for activities like rice farming. Aside from stirring controversy among water users, the changes have shrunk the amount of electricity the agency generates from its six Colorado River dams.
“Your hydropower becomes an innocent bystander of the conditions around it,” said Robert Cullick, a former River Authority spokesman who is now a consultant. (The authority has been a corporate sponsor of The Texas Tribune.)
Hydroelectricity makes up a sliver of the L.C.R.A.’s energy portfolio, a mix of coal, natural gas and wind energy, and its further decline would probably not affect the region’s energy reliability. But its possible extinction would close the book on a fuel source that played a major role in the history of Central Texas and the creation of the River Authority, whose dams make up about 40 percent of the state’s hydropower capacity.
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As a low-cost, no-pollution energy source that can be quickly turned on and off, hydroelectricity is a coveted power source, said Mr. Webber, but it’s a “pretty limited option” for Texas, where the geography and climate are ill suited for it. And since the state long ago dammed its best rivers, it is unlikely to grow much in the future. ”You’re driven by Mother Nature,” he said. “And Mother Nature has already voted.”
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/us/drought-hastens-end-of-a-regions-hydropower-era.html
