Improving the Torque of a Paddle Mini-Hydropower Plant Through Geometric Parameter Optimization and the Use of a Current Amplifier

In the presented work, the main challenge of small hydropower plants—converting low river flow velocities into high generator rotations—is investigated. It was established that applying the flow acceleration effect during interaction with surfaces makes it possible to increase the power output of a small hydropower plant by up to 25%, which corresponds to the level of an innovative solution. Stationary flow amplifiers and their influence on the dynamic interaction of blades were studied. It was revealed that the use of the amplification effect in paired configurations contributes to achieving a multiplicative effect. The potential of small hydropower plants was analytically evaluated, taking into account their dimensions and gear systems. The study was carried out using the method of computational fluid dynamics (CFD), which enables the modeling of complex hydrodynamic processes. Based on the developed three-dimensional model of the object and its discretization into a computational mesh, boundary conditions were set, and the finite volume method was applied to solve the Navier–Stokes equations. To account for turbulent flows, the k-epsilon turbulence model was employed.