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  • Review Article
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Pumped storage hydropower operation for supporting clean energy systems

Nature Reviews Clean Technology volume 1, pages 454–473 (2025)Cite this article

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Abstract

Grid-scale energy storage is increasingly important as variable renewable energy is integrated into power systems. Pumped storage hydropower (PSH) provides the largest form of energy storage in power grids, with 179 GW installed globally as of 2023. In this Review, we discuss PSH operation in power system support. There are different modes of PSH operation, including open-loop versus closed-loop systems, and binary, ternary and quaternary systems. Hybrid systems that combine PSH with hydropower or battery storage are also being developed. PSH can balance electrical demand through dispatch, frequency and voltage regulation, and other ancillary services essential to the system, with different timescales for each service. PSH could also provide long-duration energy storage and water management services such as water storage and flood control. However, there are still challenges to its deployment and operation related to power regulation quality, economics and environmental impacts. The main operational modes and management practices vary between electricity markets, but governments are working towards assessing the value of PSH energy storage to promote PSH development. Although PSH can prevent curtailment and support grid decarbonization, there are environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas emissions from operations and reservoirs and potential ecological impacts. Forms of PSH that are seawater-based, small-scale or based at former mining sites could potentially mitigate some of these impacts and enable PSH development in areas where it is not currently practical.

Key points

  • Pumped storage hydropower (PSH) has different equipment configurations serving various operation scenarios in future clean energy systems. Upgrading and digitizing equipment is critical to enhance the operation economics, reliability and flexibility of existing PSH.

  • Developing high-head, large-capacity, wide-load-range and variable-speed PSH are key technical challenges to advancing its flexible operation and development.

  • The main function of PSH is energy storage coordinated with renewables; other ancillary services, such as frequency and voltage regulation, are also increasingly important in low-carbon power systems.

  • Optimized multiscale scheduling or control of PSH with variable renewable energy and other storage systems is necessary to increase the power regulation flexibility and promote operational performance of PSH.

  • The contributions of the non-generation ancillary services supplied by PSH, such as frequency regulation, voltage support and spinning reserves, need to be sufficiently accounted for in electricity markets.

  • Some potential services, such as long-duration energy storage and water management, and development scenarios, such as seawater, small-scale and mine PSH, need to be explored.

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Fig. 1: Global PSH capacity distribution.
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Fig. 2: Technical forms of PSH and key electrical components.
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Fig. 3: PSH use in ancillary power system services.
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Fig. 4: Economic and environmental factors and impacts.
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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful for support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (no. U24B20108, no. 52079096, no. 52209114, no. 52479086), the Smart Grid-National Science and Technology Major Project (2024ZD0801600) and the Natural Science Foundation of Hubei Province of China (no. 2024AFA058), and for the suggestions of J. Yang (Wuhan University).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Water Resources Engineering and Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, PR China

    Weijia Yang  (杨威嘉), Zhigao Zhao  (赵志高), Ran Wang  (王冉), Xudong Li  (李旭东) & Yongguang Cheng  (程永光)

  2. Department of Hydraulic, Energy and Environmental Engineering, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Juan Ignacio Pérez-Díaz

  3. Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia

    Julian David Hunt

  4. Technology Platform for Hydraulic Machines (PTMH), École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausann (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland

    Elena Vagnoni

  5. Department of Electric Energy, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway

    Jonas Kristiansen Nøland

  6. European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC), Ispra, Italy

    Emanuele Quaranta

  7. Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong SAR, China

    Xudong Li  (李旭东)

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Contributions

W.Y. conducted the overall conceptual design and coordinated the writing. W.Y. and X.L. wrote the introduction and ‘Summary and future perspectives’ sections. E.V., J.K.N. and Y.C. wrote the ‘Operation and equipment’ section. Z.Z. wrote Box 2 entitled ‘Maintenance and fault diagnosis’. J.I.P.-D., Z.Z., W.Y. and R.W. wrote the ‘Balancing electrical demand’ section. W.Y., R.W., J.I.P.-D. and E.Q. wrote the ‘Economic values’ section. J.D.H., E.Q., R.W. and W.Y. wrote the ‘Broader effects and trade-offs’ section and Box 1 entitled ‘Potential PSH variations’. All authors contributed substantially to discussion, review and editing of the manuscript before submission.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Weijia Yang  (杨威嘉).

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Nature Reviews Clean Technology thanks S. Alam, P. Balducci and A. Laguna for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Related links

ESIOS: https://www.esios.ree.es/en

EU Emissions Trading System: https://climate.ec.europa.eu/eu-action/eu-emissions-trading-system-eu-ets_en

IHA Pumped Storage Tracking Tool: https://www.hydropower.org/hydropower-pumped-storage-tool

International Hydropower Association: https://www.hydropower.org/

Life-cycle assessment of pumped hydropower storage: https://www.hydro.org/paper/life-cycle-assessment-of-pumped-hydropower-storage-hydrowires/

XFLEX Hydro: https://www.xflexhydro.com/

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Yang, W., Zhao, Z., Pérez-Díaz, J.I. et al. Pumped storage hydropower operation for supporting clean energy systems. Nat. Rev. Clean Technol. 1, 454–473 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44359-025-00057-x

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