A Review on Micro Hydropower in Indonesia

This paper presents a review of status of micro hydropower in Indonesia. A micro hydropower plant can use a reaction or impulse turbine depending on the available resource. Only way to reduce the dependency on fossil fuel is by increasing the renewable energy production capabilities. It is very important to consider short term economic feasibility of renewable energy resources for developing countries. Among all renewable energy sources, hydroelectricity is the most economical and reliable source. Due to environmental concerns and very large capital cost a large hydro power station has less attraction in the present world economy. Nonetheless micro hydropower has a quite large potential to develop. Many of small rivers have much energy to exploit by hydropower electrification, from pico-hydro to micro-hydro scale. Particularly in Indonesia, in many islands country they have huge potential for using micro-hydro on many river and high rainfall because many area of Indonesia lie in equator line.