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New renewable electricity is nowadays often generated by photovoltaics and wind. Yet, their intermittent nature calls for energy storage, which is today still provided to ~95% by pumped-storage (PS) hydropower plants. However, PS is known to affect abiotic and biotic characteristics of the two connected water bodies. Thus, a two-dimensional laterally-averaged hydrodynamic and water quality model was set up to assess the impacts on water quality and temperature in a first step. Then, this analysis was extended to evaluate the additional effect of climate change, which also modifies abiotic and biotic characteristics. For this purpose, 150-years long synthetic time series of meteorological conditions for current (1998-2012) and future climate (2078-2092) were generated with a weather generator. To assess the robustness of projected impacts on the ice cover of the upper reservoir (Sihlsee) three one-dimensional, vertical hydrodynamic models were additionally set up. To attribute effects to either the PS flows or to water withdrawal from the hypolimnion, two reference scenarios were defined: one with deep-water withdrawal (NoPS) and another one with surface outflow (QNat). While the hypolimnetic temperature differs by
Julia Schmale, Hélène Paule Angot, Jenny Thomas
Damien Bouffard, Hugo Nicolás Ulloa Sánchez, Camille Roland Marie Minaudo, Janine Rüegg, Tomy Doda, Nicolas Thomas Georges Escoffier, Hannah Elisa Chmiel, Pascal Perolo
Varun Sharma, Michael Lehning, Franziska Gerber