ANASSESSMENT OF HYDROMETEOROLOGIC ASPECTS IN RESERVOIR MANAGEMENT OF THE KAINJI HYDRO POWER BUSINESS UNIT

Abstract

Efficient reservoir management, sound operational decisions and monitoring depend solely on continuous statistical analysis of instrumental records taken from hydrometric monitoring stations. Thus, collection, collation, interpretation and analysis of daily hydro meteorological quantities from within the entire Niger Basin network from the basis of reservoiroperation as well as determine the success orfailure ofhydro-plant operation. The hydro meteorological factors of constraints in the performance of hydroelectric power stations have been determined using the correlation and linear regression analysis. This has been done to determine the strength of the relationship between climatic factors and how they could affect the performance of hydro electric power station. The independent variables considered were the climatic factors which were rainfall and reservoir evaporations. The dependent variables on the other hand were reservoir elevation,averageturbine discharge andpower output. The climatic variables (independent variables) were observed to have an effect on the dependent variables. From the analysis carried out, some of the relationships were found to be strong and some weak. This has shown that climatic factors could limit the performance of hydro electric power stations. Thus, the hydro meteorological aspect of powergeneration has been found to form an integralpart ofhydropower generation.