The Tianhuangping Pumped Storage Power Station is a pumped-storage power station in Tainhuangping, Anji County

Anji County

Anji County is a county in the prefecture-level city of Huzhou in Zhejiang, People's Republic of China, with a population of 450,000. Anji county is well known for its bamboo, containing as it does 60,000 hectares of bamboo groves. It has been designated a pilot county for ecological...

 of Zhejiang Province, China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

. The power station has an installed capacity of 1836 MW utilizing 6 x reversible Francis turbine

Francis turbine

The Francis turbine is a type of water turbine that was developed by James B. Francis in Lowell, Massachusetts. It is an inward-flow reaction turbine that combines radial and axial flow concepts....

s. Construction began in 1993 and by 2004, the power station was complete.

Tianhuangping Dam

Situated on the Daxi Creek

Daxi Creek

The Daxi Creek is a tributary of the Xitiao River in Anji County of Zhejiang Province, China. It is interrupted by the Tianhuangping Dam....

, the Tianhuangping Dam creates the power station's lower reservoir. The concrete face rock-fill dam

Dam

A dam is a barrier that impounds water or underground streams. Dams generally serve the primary purpose of retaining water, while other structures such as floodgates or levees are used to manage or prevent water flow into specific land regions. Hydropower and pumped-storage hydroelectricity are...

 is 72 metres (236 ft) high and 577 metres (1,893 ft) long. The dam creates a reservoir that can store 6770000 cubic metre of water and contains an uncontrolled side-weir spillway that can discharge a design level of 536 m3/s.

Upper reservoir

From the lower reservoir, water is pumped up into the upper reservoir which has a normal storage capacity of 6760000 cubic metre. The upper reservoir is artificial and cut into the mountain and created with the assistance of four saddle dams. When power is being generated, the water leaves the reservoir and falls through three 882 metres (2,894 ft) long and 7 metres (23 ft) diameter penstock

Penstock

A penstock is a sluice or gate or intake structure that controls water flow, or an enclosed pipe that delivers water to hydraulic turbines and sewerage systems. It is a term that has been inherited from the technology of wooden watermills....

s down towards the power station which is above the lower reservoir. Before reaching the reversible turbines, the water branches off into six branch pipes.

Power station

The six branch pipes feed water into the six turbines. Each reversible Francis turbine has a 306 MW installed capacity and 336 MW maximum capacity. The turbines and generators are stored in an underground power house measuring 198.7 metres (652 ft) long, 21 metres (69 ft) wide and 47.7 metres (156 ft) high. After power is produced, the water is discharged back into the lower reservoir and the entire process can repeat.