The Reading Hydro murals recently featured in this scholarly article about Commando Jugenstil, the collective who created them. The murals are a fantastic talking point with visitors and passers-by of all ages, it’s great to see them appreciated by a very different audience.
Reading Hydro welcomed our oldest visitor to date last week! Joe, aged 99, a retired civil engineer, braved the rain to see the turbines close up, and was impressed by the technical achievement and delighted by the murals. Joe visited with his granddaughter Isla McCulloch, the Standards Manager of the Community Shares Unit. They played …
The River Thames was still thundering over Caversham weir on Friday. All this water has to go somewhere and the high flow rates have increased the river level downstream of the Reading Hydro plant. This reduces the head of water and thus the power output. Thankfully the flow of over 100 m3/s earlier in the …
Reading Hydro was set up to provide local renewable energy, because this cuts climate heating, cuts air pollution, and cuts the control of big energy businesses. But reducing the use of energy matters too. It brings these same benefits, and in addition cuts costs for the energy-user. That’s why we’re delighted to see a new …
At 8:01 this morning, Reading Hydro had generated 500 megawatt hours (MWh) of hydro electricity! That’s enough to: This renewable electricity has helped tackle climate heating. By cutting the need for gas-fired power generation, it has prevented about 200 tonnes of CO2 from going into the atmosphere.4 Many thanks to all the Reading Hydro investors …
The sluice gate problem was sorted on August 8th. Our O&M team tracked it down to a tiny check-valve that was leaking. Generation returned to nearly normal levels, but then gradually declined. On August 12th our clearance team found the reason for this second problem: Canadian pondweed had collected on the trash screens, reducing the …
You may have noticed that turbine 1 (Tony) has generated only very briefly over the past two weeks. A contractor has established that we have an internal leak in the hydraulic system that controls the sluice gate, and is looking into what needs to be done. It’s enormously annoying, since we have plenty of head …
Take a walking tour of the Reading Hydro site, using the map below and our new information boards! Board 1 gives a quick overview if you have only a few minutes to spare. Have a look at boards 5 and 3 to find out how the hydro plant works and how renewable energy helps tackle …
Seasoned weather watchers cannot have failed to notice the recent heavy rain over the last few weeks. River watchers will have also noticed the River Thames rushing under Reading Bridge towards Caversham Weir and onwards to Sonning and ultimately London and out to sea, As you can see from the graph below the river …
As part of efforts to raise climate change awareness as the intergovernmental COP27 meeting starts in Egypt this week, a leading environmental charity has recognised Reading Hydro as an ‘outstanding example’ of how community action can help combat the challenges of the climate crisis. Carbon Copy, the organisation behind the Running Out of Time Relay …
