The once-weak water flows between plains and river valleys are now being converted into clean electricity through tubular turbines.
Among hydropower equipment, tubular turbines, as the mainstay for developing low-head hydropower resources, are showing an increasingly broad application prospect. my country has vast reserves of low-head hydropower resources suitable for tubular turbine development. Resources with a head of approximately 10 meters are estimated to produce over 20 gigawatts. Combined with over 21 gigawatts of exploitable tidal energy, this provides a vast market for tubular turbines.
01 Technical Advantages: An Efficient Solution for Low-Head Hydropower
As a horizontally arranged unit with water flow parallel to the main axis, tubular turbines exhibit superior performance under low-head conditions.
Compared to vertical units, tubular turbines offer significantly higher energy conversion efficiency. This type of turbine is horizontally arranged, with a relatively shallow excavation depth, resulting in less total civil engineering work and significantly reducing civil engineering investment.
Furthermore, the tubular turbine is a dual-regulating unit. Its power generation condition is controlled by guide vanes, which adjust the water flow rate, and by propeller blades, which adjust the turbine efficiency, thus ensuring operation within the highest efficiency range.
In the 3-20 meter head range, tubular turbines perform particularly well, effectively developing low-head resources that were previously difficult to economically utilize. In particular, tubular turbines have become the preferred choice for hydropower development below 25 meters.
02 Application Prospects: From Rivers to Oceans
As medium- and high-head hydropower resources are increasingly depleted, the development of low-head resources is becoming increasingly important, and tubular turbines hold great potential in this area.
my country is rich in low-head hydropower resources, primarily located in economically developed and densely populated plains or river valleys. In these areas, tubular turbines can achieve comprehensive utilization functions such as power generation, flood control, and shipping, while also contributing to the protection of the ecological environment and land resources.
Notably, tubular turbines have broad application prospects in tidal power generation. Tubular pump-turbines suitable for tidal power stations are required not only to provide unidirectional power generation and pumping, but sometimes also to provide bidirectional power generation, pumping, and discharge.
With the advancement of the “dual carbon” goals, the new generation of tubular turbines, through technological innovations such as CFD optimization and intelligent control, is expected to achieve efficiency improvements of over 2% and lifespan extensions of 30%.
03 Technological Progress: From Catching Up to Leading
my country has made significant progress in tubular turbine technology. To address prominent operational issues such as low efficiency, severe erosion damage, and large coupling deviations, Chinese research teams, through nearly 30 years of collaborative research between industry, academia, and research, have innovated the design theory of turbine flow components and established a comprehensive anti-erosion technology system for axial-flow and tubular turbines.
Specific technological breakthroughs include: the pioneering of a fully three-dimensional runner design method with rotational inversion, achieving integrated runner and draft tube design; the invention of a method for identifying the initiation of cavitation in turbines; and the development of a technology system for anti-erosion of propeller-type turbines.
These technological achievements have reduced the runner overhaul cycle for power stations with high-sediment-content water flow from 2-3 years to approximately 5 years, significantly improving the economic efficiency of the units.
The highest efficiency of several hydraulic models of tubular turbines developed in my country has exceeded 94%. The Taocha tubular turbine model achieves an efficiency of 94.25%, the highest in the world, achieving a shift from technology import to technology export.
Post time: Sep-26-2025
