Technology Development for Fish Passage
Using funding from the Water Power Program, DOE's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has initiated a redesign of their Sensor Fish, a device filled with sensors to measure the conditions that real fish experience when passing through a hydropower turbine. The device has already proven very valuable, providing information that is otherwise unobtainable in order to ensure the safe fish passage. Throughout the redesign, PNNL will expand the types of tests the Sensor Fish can assist with, reduce the overall cost of producing the Sensor Fish, improve its data storage capacity, and improve its realistic representation in a set of new conditions. The ultimate goal is to make the Sensor Fish commercially available so that industry personnel can buy and use one right off the shelf.