Hydroelectric dams don't work?

[Lt Space Orange]

I built a hydroelectric dam in my city which had a projected output of around 21MW and at its highest, I've only seen around 8KW. Are dams broken or did I just not build it right?

[BigBiker05]

So they need to fill with water first. You can hover over efficiency and it will say 1%, water too low. First map I was playing (sweeping plains maybe, don't remember) the water wasn't rising. I checked the contour lines and the river didn't really elevate above sea level.

Now I'm playing waterway pass. Check the counter lines and the river does go significantly downhill. Built a tall dam above river at the big canyon. However, its taking forever to fill. But I keep checking and it is slowly rising.

For now I disabled the dam. Says it'll just have a small maintenance fee. Water seems to still be rising, I'll turn it back on once it hit those intake holes and hopefully be able to start selling electricity.

[Azi]

I have the same issue. I built a dam right at the mountain output (where the water flow was fast/showing purple arrows) to see if that would work, it filled up completely, but it still only had 1% efficiency and hardly made any electricity. When I click on the building it always says water depth is too low. I cant believe it needs to be this hard to make it work, so I hope they look into it.

[Lt Space Orange]

Heres a screenshot of my dam, as you can see it was filled to the point it was flowing past.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3060472985

[Mały Radio]

The same issue here. I have also a problem with somewhat leaking dam. It seams to be just a graphical glith, but nevertheless, is soo annoying to make a nice screenshots with that glith. https://steamcommunity.com/id/Radioaktywny444/screenshot/2120691978794135659/

[Lt Space Orange]

Originally posted by Mały Radio:

The same issue here. I have also a problem with somewhat leaking dam. It seams to be just a graphical glith, but nevertheless, is soo annoying to make a nice screenshots with that glith. https://steamcommunity.com/id/Radioaktywny444/screenshot/2120691978794135659/

It also causes flooding in houses that are beneath it...

[lnomsim]

Ah someone recycled the code from dams when the first game was first released.
It had the same exact issue.

[Kedryn]

Someone on bug forums said the dams were being placed (as in auto placed by game, not user error) backwards from what current says it should be.

[Azi]

Originally posted by Lt Space Orange:

Heres a screenshot of my dam, as you can see it was filled to the point it was flowing past.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3060472985

Exactly like I had made as well, and I checked the water flow was fast also - still 99% inefficiency due to low water depth, as you.

[AceOfSpades]

Originally posted by Kedryn:

Someone on bug forums said the dams were being placed (as in auto placed by game, not user error) backwards from what current says it should be.

I dont think thats the case, when you look at the dam you can clearly see the spillway for emergency release is sloped downstream ect

Originally posted by Azi:

Originally posted by Lt Space Orange:

Heres a screenshot of my dam, as you can see it was filled to the point it was flowing past.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3060472985

Exactly like I had made as well, and I checked the water flow was fast also - still 99% inefficiency due to low water depth, as you.

Even though it looks full it isnt. If the backwater is very shallow and wide it can take hours to fill. I have two working dams on one map. ONe stream fed one river fed. The river fed filled in a few real time hours the stream fed one which was a big lake took about 6 real hours.
But dont bother you will still be plagued with the low water. The best I have gotten on one dam is 11% efficiency from low water. 5% on the other. Still netted some lectricity but not worth it. Plus when it starts to work water just pours out from all around it lol

[Schorsche]

=> turn off, turn on, receive energy.

[Schorsche]

btw, this can be a game changer looking on service costs per MW. High build invest but steady income on energy export, no pollution on air and ground. Put it to the entry of you map, noise wont impact then too much.

[Azi]

Originally posted by AceOfSpades:

Originally posted by Kedryn:

Someone on bug forums said the dams were being placed (as in auto placed by game, not user error) backwards from what current says it should be.

I dont think thats the case, when you look at the dam you can clearly see the spillway for emergency release is sloped downstream ect

Originally posted by Azi:

Exactly like I had made as well, and I checked the water flow was fast also - still 99% inefficiency due to low water depth, as you.

Even though it looks full it isnt. If the backwater is very shallow and wide it can take hours to fill. I have two working dams on one map. ONe stream fed one river fed. The river fed filled in a few real time hours the stream fed one which was a big lake took about 6 real hours.
But dont bother you will still be plagued with the low water. The best I have gotten on one dam is 11% efficiency from low water. 5% on the other. Still netted some lectricity but not worth it. Plus when it starts to work water just pours out from all around it lol

I’m getting ~70+ efficiency on the one I got working on the mountain map. It took less than 5 real minutes to fill up. It is also fed by the two rivers on the map.

[Kezra_Dirac]

Remove as much dirt in front and back of the dam so that it looks rectangular on both faces. If the earth comes sloping in from each end towards the center it lowers the efficiency.

[juliia_24]

How to connect 800 +++ Mw DAM to grid ? It has only 2 connections and it only supports 400 MW per connection .... anyone can help ?

[MrFisse]

Height difference between the intake and outake side is what matters, also the length if the dam. You do not have enough height in the screens you provided. To get rid of the low water debuff you will need quite some more distance between those two variables, more than you would think.