The Poatina Power Station is a
conventional hydroelectric
Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies one sixth of the world's electricity, almost 4500 TWh in 2020, which is more than all other renewable sources combined and ...
power station
A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electrical grid.
Many p ...
located in the
Central Highlands region of
Tasmania
)
, nickname =
, image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdi ...
, Australia. The power station is situated on the
Great Lake and
South Esk and is owned and operated by
Hydro Tasmania
Hydro Tasmania, known for most of its history as the Hydro-Electric Commission (HEC) or The Hydro, is the trading name of the Hydro-Electric Corporation, a Tasmanian Government business enterprise which is the predominant electricity generator i ...
.
Technical details
Located in the Great Lake and South Esk catchment area, Poatina makes use of a descent from the
Great Western Tiers
The Great Western Tiers are a collection of mountain bluffs that form the northern edge of the Central Highlands plateau in Tasmania, Australia. The bluffs are contained within the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Site.
The bluffs stretch ...
to the Norfolk Plains in Tasmania's northern
Midlands
The Midlands (also referred to as Central England) are a part of England that broadly correspond to the Kingdom of Mercia of the Early Middle Ages, bordered by Wales, Northern England and Southern England. The Midlands were important in the Ind ...
.
[
] Water from Great Lake is diverted via a tunnel to the edge of the Great Western Tiers where it plummets down a viable
penstock
A penstock is a sluice or gate or intake structure that controls water flow, or an enclosed pipe that delivers water to hydro turbines and sewerage systems. The term is inherited from the earlier technology of mill ponds and watermills.
H ...
line, which enters the ground again near the power station. The Poatina Power Station is located underground in a massive artificial cavern hence the name Poatina,
Palawa for "cavern" or "cave". The headrace tunnel and penstocks were bored through
mudstone
Mudstone, a type of mudrock, is a fine-grained sedimentary rock whose original constituents were clays or muds. Mudstone is distinguished from '' shale'' by its lack of fissility (parallel layering).Blatt, H., and R.J. Tracy, 1996, ''Petrology. ...
with the aid of a
Robbins Mole. Water leaves the power station via a roughly long tailrace tunnel and discharges into the
Macquarie River
The Macquarie River - Wambuul is part of the Macquarie– Barwon catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is one of the main inland rivers in New South Wales, Australia.
The river rises in the central highlands of New South Wales near the ...
via Brumbies Rivulet.
Poatina was commissioned in 1964, and replaced the
Waddamana
Waddamana is a rural locality in the local government area (LGA) of Central Highlands in the Central LGA region of Tasmania. The locality is about north of the town of Hamilton. The 2016 census has a population of 4 for the state suburb of Wa ...
and
Shannon power stations. The small construction village of
Poatina sits perched on top of a low plateau, from the stations subterranean location.
[
The power station has six vertical shaft generating sets, five Boving ]Pelton-type
The Pelton wheel or Pelton Turbine is an impulse-type water turbine invented by American inventor Lester Allan Pelton in the 1870s. The Pelton wheel extracts energy from the impulse of moving water, as opposed to water's dead weight like the trad ...
turbines
A turbine ( or ) (from the Greek , ''tyrbē'', or Latin ''turbo'', meaning vortex) is a rotary mechanical device that extracts energy from a fluid flow and converts it into useful Work (physics), work. The work produced by a turbine can be used ...
of which three are upgraded Andritz turbines and one Fuji Fuji may refer to:
Places China
* Fuji, Xiangcheng City (付集镇), town in Xiangcheng City, Henan
Japan
* Mount Fuji, the tallest mountain in Japan
* Fuji River
* Fuji, Saga, town in Saga Prefecture
* Fuji, Shizuoka, city in Shizuoka Prefectur ...
Pelton-type turbine with a combined generating capacity of of electricity. The station output, estimated at annually,[ is fed to TasNetworks' transmission grid via underground circuit breakers to two 16 k V/110 kV and four 16 kV/220 kV generator transformers located in the switchyard above.][
]
2016 Tasmanian energy crisis
The Poatina output in early 2016 had dropped to one-fifth of capacity due to ongoing water shortage in Tasmania's hydro system.
See also
* List of power stations in Tasmania
This is a list of active power stations in Tasmania, Australia. Candidates for this list must already be commissioned and capable of generating or more of electricity.
Gas Thermal gas
These power stations use gas combustion to power steam ...
References
External links
*Hydro Tasmania
Hydro Tasmania, known for most of its history as the Hydro-Electric Commission (HEC) or The Hydro, is the trading name of the Hydro-Electric Corporation, a Tasmanian Government business enterprise which is the predominant electricity generator i ...
page o
Great Lake-South Esk scheme
{{CentralHighlandsTasmania
Energy infrastructure completed in 1964
Hydroelectric power stations in Tasmania
Central Highlands (Tasmania)
Energy crisis, 2016