| Author | Piya, Ameya |
| Call Number | AIT Thesis no.WM-18-18 |
| Note | A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the
Degree of Master of Engineering in
Water Engineering and Management, School of Engineering and Technology |
| Publisher | Asian Institute of Technology |
| Abstract | The research was done to study the potential of RoR hydropower in Karnali River Basin, Nepal considering sustainability. Karnali region is one of the remote region of Nepal and has three big rivers i.e. Karnali, Bheri and Seti which are snow fed perineal rivers. Also the terrain variation in the region is very high i.e. varies from 118m to 7726m. These two factors discharge and head is very important for producing hydropower electricity. Since much study was not done in this region for its scope on hydropower production, Karnali region was selected. The total basin area is very big and remote, so GIS was used for calculating head and finding river network and SWAT hydrological model was used for calculating discharge. Apart from finding the potential sites, sustainability factor was also considered to locate the sites. Sustainability factor considering economy, social and environment scenario was taken.
ARC GIS was used to calculate the river network and hydraulic head. A total of 141 potential sites were found out having different head. SWAT model was used to calculate the discharge. The model was validated and calibrated in two discharge station i.e. Chisapani (Karnali River) and Samajhighat (Bheri River). The NSE value for daily discharge calibration is 0.75 and 0.66 for the respective stations which are both in the acceptable range. The PBIAS values are 24.70 and 16.62 respectively. The R2 value was calculated as 0.80 and 0.69 respectively. The validation was also performed on the same station from 2006- 2013 A.D. The NSE value for daily discharge validation is 0.70 and 0.71 for the respective stations which are both in the acceptable range. The PBIAS values are 26.67 and 16.54 respectively. The R2 value was calculated as 0.75 respectively. After that the flow duration curve of all the sub basin was calculated and environmental flow subtracted to identify the design discharge. Power formula was used and hydro power potential was calculated as 4948 MW for the basin.
Moreover, the sites were ranked according to different sustainability scenarios. The scenarios were economic, social and environmental. The scenarios consists of different factors and each factors were normalized and given weights. After that the ranking of hydropower sites was done. It was found out that economic and equal weight scenario prefer sites with higher potential but social and economic scenario prefers sites with low potential. It was concluded that from this research there is great hydropower potential in Karnal River Basin, Nepal and it should be used for betterment of the country. |
| Year | 2018 |
| Type | Thesis |
| School | School of Engineering and Technology (SET) |
| Department | Department of Civil and Infrastucture Engineering (DCIE) |
| Academic Program/FoS | Water Engineering and Management (WM) |
| Chairperson(s) | Shrestha, Sangam ; |
| Examination Committee(s) | Babel, Mukand Singh;Sarawut Ninsawat;Supattana Wichakul; |
| Scholarship Donor(s) | AIT Fellowship; |