Design and Development of Crossflow Turbine for Off-Grid Electrification
Asfafaw H. Tesfay (),
Sirak A. Weldemariam and
Kalekiristos G. Gebrelibanos
Additional contact information
Asfafaw H. Tesfay: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, S.P. Andersens Veg 5, 7491 Trondheim, Norway
Sirak A. Weldemariam: Institute of Energy, Mekelle University, Mekelle P.O. Box 231, Ethiopia
Kalekiristos G. Gebrelibanos: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, S.P. Andersens Veg 5, 7491 Trondheim, Norway
Energies, 2025, vol. 18, issue 19, 1-18
Abstract:
Investing in large-scale hydropower is on the rise in Ethiopia in accordance with the country’s climate-resilient green economy strategy. Rural electrification is a top priority on the development agenda of the country, with very limited off-grid interventions. Although small-scale hydropower can bring various social and economic benefits compared to other off-grid solutions, it is hardly localized in the country. The motivation for this research is to break this technological bottleneck by synergizing and strengthening the local capacity. Accordingly, this paper presents the full-scale crossflow turbine design and development process of a power plant constructed to give electricity access to about 450 households in a rural village called Amentila. Based on a site survey and the resource potential, the power plant was designed for a 125 kW peak at 0.3 m 3 /s of discharge with a 53 m head. The crossflow was selected based on the head, discharge, and simplicity of development with the available local capacities. The detailed design of the turbine and its auxiliary components was developed and simulated using SolidWorks and CFD ANSYS CFX. The power plant has a run-of-river design, targeting provision of power during peak hours. This study demonstrates an off-grid engineering solution with applied research on the water–energy–food–environment nexus.
Keywords: small hydropower; crossflow turbine; rural electrification; off-grid electrification; run-of-river; renewable energy; hydropower development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:
Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/18/19/5108/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/18/19/5108/ (text/html)
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:18:y:2025:i:19:p:5108-:d:1758405
Access Statistics for this article
Energies is currently edited by Ms. Cassie Shen
More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().