Water has been used as a source of energy from 30 AD onwards, including gristmills, hullers, sawmills, shipmills, stamp mills, steel mills, sugar mills, flour mills and tide mills etc.

This system has culminated with the construction of dams all over the world from the Hoover Dam to the recently finished Three Gorges Dam located in the Yiling District of Yichang, in Hubei province, China. The total electric generating capacity of this dam will eventually reach 22,500 MW.

There are many advantages for using this type of energy production mainly because it is so easily activated when the need requires and also because it is a very efficient way to store energy.

However there are also certain problems this technology has created :

• though it is until today the most important source of renewable energy, it is regarded as outdated, a technology of the past
• it is also perceived as a disrupter of the environment (There are also questions about the environment and ecosystem evolution that have been caused by the construction of these edifices)

My project covers many investigations into the use of fresh water as a generator of energy; from studies into the re-interpretation of existing dams to so-called 'visionary' projects that imagine new applications of hydro power. 

Projects that revitalize the image of hydropower

• to look at this developments as a transition rather than a disruption
• to shape this transitional process.
• to revitalize the image of hydro power and change the perception of a dam
• to make the hydro power installations more transparent, easier to understand

Projects that stimulate the use of hydropower

The project could investigate change the perception of hydro power as such, upgrading it, bringing it up to date (concept car approach), should trigger the imagination, that inspires

• energy generation on more personal scale, (even a portable device)
• hydro power installations as part of the architecture
• digital systems that visualize how the amount of power that is produced and how it is used.
• floating hydro power installations
• hydro power bridge constructions
• etc.

My semester will commence with a general research phase collecting information about the subject culminating in an ‘exposé’ synthesizing this research. Then each student will choose his or her field of study developing ideas, and refining them to prepare for the final presentation.