THRYBERGH HYDROPOWER STATION

Commissioning date: September 2015

 

Location: River Don, nr. Rotherham

 

Turbine: Twin Archimedes Screws

 

Maximum output: 260kW

 

Annual generation: 1 million kWh

 

Catchment area: 880 km2

 

Maximum turbine flow: 12 cumecs

 

Maximum head: 3.15 m

 

 

 

BUILDING A HYDROPOWER STATION

• The system was designed by ANF Consulting and JNP of Brighouse.

• It comprises twin Archimedes Screws manufactured by Spaans Babcock.

• It has been delivered by Eric Wright Civil Engineering, on time and to budget, aided by Cobalt Project Management.

• It is connected to the grid via a Northern Powergrid substation at the site.

• Commissioned in September 2015 it:

  • delivers up to 260kW of capacity, generating around 1,000,000 units (kWh) per annum

  • enough electricity to take around 300 average UK homes off the grid almost  in perpetuity

THE PROJECT

• Barn Energy has consulted very closely since March 2013 with local angling groups, the Don Catchment River Trust, neighbours and landlords (the Environment Agency and the Canal & River Trust)

• Environment Agency Abstraction Licences (for hydro and fish passage) and Rotherham Planning Permission were granted in September 2014 with not one expression of dissent made.

FISH AND EEL PASSAGE

• Weirs have been effective and complete obstacles to upstream salmon/trout passage – and returning eel and elver populations;

• This scheme sees the removal of that obstacle at Thrybergh weir, providing these species, plus adult coarse fish, the means to migrate upstream for the first time for centuries;

• A so-called Larinier fish pass, together with an eel pass on the weir, and a revision of the defunct structure on the weir as a bywash, together with the new fish pass at Sprotbrough, provides connectivity on the Don, another step on the way to getting salmon to Sheffield.  For details of the earlier project see https://www.gov.uk/government/news/bringing-salmon-back-to-south-yorkshire