A physical-chemical study of water resources in 5 hydropower projects

Abstract

Over the last 60 years, renewable energies have substantially developed; in 2021, around 12.8% of global primary energy came from these technologies. Thus, even though renewable energies have good global acceptance present challenges in quantifying the environmental, social, and cultural effects, generating a lack of knowledge of the impact caused. Nowadays, hydropower is the renewable source with the most significant participation; at the end of 2020, the hydropower installed capacity worldwide was 1,330 GW, and 4,370 TWh were generated in that year. Therefore, the manuscript aims to determine if there are changes in water quality due to the use of hydropower generation in five projects distributed in Ecuador, Argentina, and Uruguay. The methodology is quantitative experimental; experimental because it takes water samples to measure parameters and qualitatively compares the lab results to do statistical analyses. Based on the ten samples gathered, it concluded that from 14 physical and chemical parameters, the principal divergences fluctuated in the presence of dissolved solids (26%), total solids (21%), bicarbonates (15%), total hardness (14%), suspended solids (6%), and sodium (4%). Additionally, values show organic matter existence due to vegetation decomposition, and metabolites formed in dams such as Salto Grande, Hidroagoyan, Minas San Francisco, Baba, and Coca Codo Sinclair.