From Design to Delivery: Advancing Global Hydropower Systems

Hydropower investment is growing as energy systems work to meet rising demand with a more diverse mix of generation sources. In addition to producing renewable electricity, hydro strengthens grid resiliency, increases flexibility and maintains stability when wind and solar output fluctuates. Its long asset life and role in major infrastructure projects make it a strategically important part of the global energy transition.

The Timken Company helps hydropower customers address complex challenges in demanding conditions. Around the world, including Australia, Ethiopia and the United States, the company’s engineers work with system designers on crucial applications like gate equipment, where precise water control is essential to consistent power generation and environmental stewardship.

Stabilizing Australia’s power grid for generations

In Australia’s Snowy Mountains, the 4.0 gigawatt (GW) Snowy 2.0 project stands among the world’s most ambitious infrastructure projects and is designed to serve for the next 150 years. The underground pumped-storage hydro station expansion links two reservoirs with a new power station through a network of tunnels. Targeted to begin full operation in 2028, it’s expected to provide long-term energy storage to support renewable power on the grid and deliver enough electricity to serve more than three million homes.   

Performance matters at every level in a system of that scale. Snowy 2.0 project designers, for example, need to address challenges tied to regulating gates operating in a wet, corrosive environment that also limit access for routine lubrication and maintenance. Standard spherical roller bearing configurations can make that work more difficult.

“Customers do not think about systems one component at a time. They need confidence that the full application will perform as intended, and that is where the combined expertise across Timken creates real value.”

Michael Fu
Advanced Application Engineer

Timken engineers partnered with designers to solve the issue with a custom spherical roller bearing that allows lubrication to flow from the bearing’s shaft side rather than the outer ring side, improving maintenance access in the field. The design also incorporates stainless steel to better withstand the water-intensive environment.

For Michael Fu, advanced application engineer, that level of detailed engineering work helps solve the hydro industry’s most critical application challenges.  

“Anything we can do to extend component life in each hydro application helps customers protect their investment, improve efficiency and deliver reliable power to people,” said Michael Fu, advanced application engineer.

Supporting Ethiopia’s emerging energy leadership

Designers supporting the 2.16GW Koysha Hydropower Project in Ethiopia face different but equally demanding conditions as Australia. Wheel gate assemblies and intake wheel gates regulate water flow under high water pressure in the county’s second-to-largest hydropower facility along the Omo River, which is scheduled for completion in 2029.

Application engineers with specialized knowledge in self-lubricating plain bearings, who joined the team through the company’s acquisition of GGB, in 2022, came to the project with an existing relationship with the system designer built over several previous hydro projects.

That early involvement helped the GGB team address application challenges shaped by harsh operating conditions, exposure to moisture and constrained maintenance access.

GGB experts developed self-lubricating plain bearing solutions for both gates. They use special materials to provide maintenance-free, low friction and low wear over a long service life. Larger bearing solutions support the radial gates while a smaller size range supports the wheel gates, underscoring GGB’s focus on aligning solutions to the specific technical requirements and design envelope of each system.

For Stefano Bachis, GGB regional sales manager located in Italy, early collaboration in the design process is central to finding the right solution.

“GGB has global application engineering capabilities, and we’ve built a strong presence in hydropower as an expert supplier with a track record of supporting strategic projects around the world,” he said. “Our customers value the fact that we work to understand their mechanical and tribological requirements based on operating conditions at the very beginning of a project.”

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Comprehensive expertise for complex hydropower systems

Hydropower systems depend on more than gate equipment. Cranes, hoists, sheaves, gearboxes and other drive-related systems also play critical roles, often under very different operating conditions.

That range of applications is where Timken’s broader capabilities matter. In Australia, Timken is exploring how GGB plain bearing solutions could support future phases of Snowy 2.0. In Canada, the designer of Ethiopia’s Koysha project is integrating Timken spherical roller bearing solutions into British Columbia’s Ladore Falls modernization, where seismic upgrades are helping strengthen the grid against earthquake and flood risks.

“Customers do not think about these systems one component at a time,” Fu said. “They need confidence that the full application will perform as intended, and that is where the combined expertise across Timken creates real value.”

Hydropower is one example of how the broad Timken portfolio serves customers’ complex system-level application challenges. Explore more Timken World stories on the engineering expertise supporting industries from aerospace to factory automation.