How to generate electricity from a flowing water or river.?

Answer 1

probably the only way is going to be using the water to turn a turbine that generates electricity, there may be some chemicla potential methods.

sources of flowing water could be a river or tidal current, or possibly wave power.

rivers can be used to generate power using hydro schems, often involving a dam or other mechanism to hold back water to guarantee supply and flow rates. Hydro requires one of 2 elements, preferably both: either water height differrntial or volume / flow rate. The differnece in height, of flow of water forces a turbine to move. You cold connect a water wheel to a generator set that has low volumne or low height drop. however it wouldn't generate much power. A varation of the hydro scheme is going to be soemhting lioke the stored power scheme as shown by 'electric mountain' Nr Bangor North Wales.

tidal power can be used in barrages (efectively a dam is placed across a bay, estuary or sea channel and the water flowing through sluices in the barrage generates power.. effectively its another variation on a hydro scheme

wave power is still in development and isnt proven yet to generate electricity.. it can generate low voltage/low current but not proven significant amounts of power, wave power can either use the physical movement of the wave as it passes (something like 'salters ducks', or using the wave hitting an obstruction that forces air in or out of a chamber to spin a wind turbine

a variation on tidal power is tidal current.. effectively its like planting a wind turbine at he bottom of the sea, using the movement of the current to generate power... there is no barrage, but generation capacity is dramatically less. Its also unproven, although there are some interestign developments

Answer 2

how much do you need. If you are talking about a City sized power supply then you need to build a dam to provide a constant flow.

If you are talking about powering up a small cabin in the wilderness then you need a stream that is year round and can either turn a water wheel connected to an alternator or generator. Since rivers rise or fall during the year and will leave your wheel high and dry or submerged, a stream or feeder from the river that can be diverted to where it drops on to and turns a generator via a ('pinon' I think it was called) wheel.

Once you generate the elec, for the small site, you need to also have storage batteries to both save some and to make the general output somewhat stabilized.

good luck...

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Answer 3

known as Hydroelectricity, A dam in generally built across the river to force water through a water wheel that spins a turbine which generates electricity.

Answer 4

a few options.

The most common ways use the potential energy
of the water to move a magnet near a wire or a wire
through a magnetic field....e.g. turn a generator.
this is what is done in most hydroelectric dams.
just search hydroelctricity or hydroelectric.

look up magnetohydrodynamic drives for another option.

Answer 5

you ought to use a turbine to generate electrical energy from the river bypass. yet undergo in innovations that it will create small turbulence interior the bypass. yet once you're thinking to apply this electrical energy to hold water on your bond, i'm unsure in the adventure that your turbine will generate adequate wattage to run a good-looking pump

Answer 6

you must of heard of a water wheel, just a matter of channeling into one place

Answer 7

you would need a water wheel connected to a turbine

Answer 8

usually from dams
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroelectricity