In response to Executive Order 14017 on America’s Supply Chains, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) conducted supply chain “deep dives” for renewable energy technologies, including hydropower and large power transformers, a critical part of a hydropower installation. Since the deep dives were published, the Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO) has focused on improving the understanding of the hydropower supply chain and developing strategies for addressing supply chain challenges. Because the challenges outlined in the deep dives are most acute for large hydropower systems, this report focuses on large systems, but it is expected that the recommendations will improve the supply chain for all hydropower systems.
Finally, since the federal government owns almost 50% of the nameplate capacity for conventional hydropower systems with 40% (18 gigawatts) of these units being at least 100 MW, the federal fleet is used to prime the development of the supply chain for the rest of industry. This report “Hydropower Supply Chain Gap Analysis” by NREL summarizes WPTO’s efforts in the listed focus areas and complements the earlier work by further exploring the identified challenges and conducting a detailed gap analysis of the domestic hydropower supply chain. Specific, actionable recommendations are made to address gaps. The report summarizes recent legislation impacting hydropower deployment and/or its supply chain. It outlines the hydropower demand signal for both new builds to meet clean energy goals as well as refurbishments and upgrades of the current domestic fleet.
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