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 […]
What’s up with Tony? Read More »
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
Information boards Read More »
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
Recent rains have reduced our generation Read More »
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
Reading Hydro highlighted at COP27 Read More »
Great news – today (23rd October) the Environment Agency gave us permission to generate again, and both turbines were re-started just after noon!The river flow at Thames Bridge had continued to run at about 5 cumecs (cubic meters per second) overnight, but surged above 10 cumecs by noon because of the heavy rain.River conditions are
Generation starts again Read More »
With COP27 scheduled for next month, and nearly a year since COP26 in Glasgow, an extraordinary relay linking Glasgow to Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt, is being undertaken by hundreds of people across Europe and the Middle East. Known as the ‘Running Out of Time‘ (ROoT) relay, the Carbon Copy charity has brought together a community of
Reading Hydro participates in Running Out of Time relay Read More »
Reading Hydro volunteer Wilson Chan is a PhD student at Reading University, carrying out research on the impacts of climate change on UK water resources. He’s applied his data modelling expertise to predict likely flow in the River Thames over the next few months. In a future blog he’ll update the data and also discuss the
Low flows for the River Thames at Reading is likely to continue Read More »
You will have noticed if you regularly walk past our turbines that they haven’t been turning for quite some time If you look at the power generation page on our website you will see that Reading Hydro hasn’t generated any electricity since 1st July. You can also see from the river conditions data on our
Why we are not generating Read More »
You may have noticed if you have walked past our turbines or looked at the live data feed on our website that we have only been running one of the two turbines for half of May. This is because we have had a bearing failure on Turbine 2 (Sophie), the one furthest away from the
A quick and successful repair after an unexpected failure Read More »
This aerial photo was taken in August 1928 and shows Caversham Weir and View Island towards the bottom of the image. A large house can be seen on View Island along with gardens and another smaller property. On the Reading side of the Thames, what is now Thames Lido is visible in Kings Meadow. This
Historic aerial photos of the Hydro site Read More »
