Dinorwig Power Station
| Dinorwig Power Station | |
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Part of the power station as seen on the exterior of Elidir Fawr.
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 Location of Dinorwig Power Station in Wales
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| Location | Dinorwig, Wales |
| Coordinates | 53°07′07″N 04°06′50″W / 53.11861°N 4.11389°WCoordinates: 53°07′07″N 04°06′50″W / 53.11861°N 4.11389°W |
| Construction began | 1974 |
| Opening date | 1984 |
| Construction cost | £425 million |
| Reservoir | |
| Creates | Upper: Marchlyn Mawr Lower: Llyn Peris |
| Power station | |
| Commission date | 1984 |
| Type | Pumped-storage |
| Turbines | 6 × 300 MW (400,000 hp) |
| Installed capacity | 1,650 MW (2,210,000 hp) |
The Dinorwig Power Station (/dᵻˈnɔːrwɪɡ/; Welsh: [dɪˈnɔrwɪɡ]) is a 1,728-megawatt (2,317,000 hp) pumped-storage hydroelectric scheme, near Dinorwig, Llanberis in Snowdonia national park in Gwynedd, north Wales. Its purpose is not to help meet peak loads but as a "Short Term Operating Reserve", to provide a fast response to short-term rapid changes in power demand.
The original purpose of the scheme was to deal with the difficulty that the National Grid would have had if the large numbers of nuclear power stations then planned had been built. Nuclear power stations must be run at close to full output all of the time so storage capacity was needed for excess power generated at times of low demand. Electric night storage heaters and the Economy 7 tariff fulfill a similar purpose.
The stall in the UK nuclear power programme after privatisation and the coincident "dash for gas" increased the network's ability to respond to changes in demand, making the use of pumped storage for day/night load balancing less attractive. As a result, a similar facility planned for Exmoor was never built. With the increase of renewables such as wind and solar power, the need for storage is expected to increase.
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