Natel Energy | Winter 2025 Updates

Happy New Year! In 2024, we broadened our design range to include FishSafe designs for Francis-style runners, and we removed our design limit on head height. In 2025, we’re excited to expand the adoption of FishSafe turbines and continue advancing sustainable hydropower. Here's a look at a few more recent highlights: 

🏆 The USPTO selected Natel for a Patents for Humanity: Green Energy Award for our FishSafe Restoration Hydro Turbine patent.

📈 The FishSafe Monroe Drop Hydro Project closed out the 2024 season with 94% availability and 100% turbine availability, making it the project's most productive season to date.

🐟 MCJ Newsletter published a piece by Gia Schneider about the once-in-a-generation opportunity to modernize hydropower and protect fish, and Sterling Watson spoke to Hydro Leader about why developing FishSafe turbines is rewarding work.

📆 We presented at Hydro 2024 about double-regulated FishSafe-Kaplan turbines and we led a tour of the nearby FishSafe Sauerbrunn Hydropower plant. We're looking forward to a full lineup of upcoming events!

FishSafe turbines reduce sediment impact velocity and minimize abrasion

A new white paper details tests following IEC Standard 62364, in which Natel’s FishSafe blades showed up to 78.5% less wear in high-sediment conditions, when compared to conventional turbine blades. This resistance to erosion can translate to a 5x longer blade life in sediment-laden environments, reduced maintenance costs and outages, longer asset life, and consistently higher turbine efficiency over time.

Join us for a public webinar January 21st at 10am PT to learn more!

Upgrading existing hydropower plants with high-performance, FishSafe turbines

FishSafe runners support healthier rivers by coupling plant modernization with exceptional downstream fish passage. Did you know that they also reduce cost, increase plant safety, and simplify operations? 

Press Spotlight

The US Patent and Trademark Office awarded Natel the Patents for Humanity: Green Energy Award in recognition of the FishSafe Restoration Hydro Turbine (RHT) patent for contributing an invention to the renewable energy space that  addresses both climate change and biodiversity loss. Abe Schneider accepted the award in Washington, DC in December.

Hydropower is a vital resource for a zero-carbon future, and modernizing aging plants with innovative, FishSafe turbines can reduce operating costs, extend asset life, and help meet environmental requirements

by protecting aquatic ecosystems. Read more about hydropower's once-in-a-generation opportunity from Natel co-founder and CCO Gia Schneider in the My Climate Journey newsletter.

Principal Engineer Sterling Watson spoke with Hydro Leader magazine about leading FishSafe turbine design at Natel and about how working for a sustainably-minded renewable energy company inspires her and other young professionals. Flip to pg 32.

While owned and operated by Natel, the LIHI-certified Monroe Hydro Project closed out the 2024 season with 94% availability and 100% turbine availability, generating 917 MWh of energy in a six-month period with one FishSafe turbine. In December, Now Energy purchased the plant.

Gia Schneider spoke to Polish hydropower magazine Energetyka Wodna about how she and Abe were inspired to focus Natel's work on designing turbines that preserve aquatic ecosystems and how FishSafe turbines can support sustainable hydropower globally. Scroll down to pg 51.

Our FishSafe family is growing!
 We now design FishSafe Francis turbines and double-regulated FishSafe propeller and Kaplan turbines for sites with a variety of head heights. 

 We'll work with you to assess how FishSafe runners can help meet performance, regulatory, and budgetary goals. Feasibility studies can be completed in 3-6 months.

Events Roundup

November took us to Austria, to the Hydro 2024 conference in Graz, where Abe Schneider and Sterling Watson presented a paper on double-regulated FishSafe turbine designs. After the conference, we led a tour of the Sauerbrunn Plant, which is owned and operated by Energie Steiermark and uses Europe's first FishSafe turbine to power the local community.

Back in the States, Jessica Penrod spoke about innovations in hydropower at the NHA's California Regional Meeting in Redding.

Next up, Jessica Penrod will be at the NWHA's Annual Conference in Seattle, Washington, Feb 24-25.

Look for us in booth 210 at CEATI's Hydropower Conference in Palm Springs, California, March 25-26.

Abe Schneider will be at the VGBE & VÖU River Management & Ecology and Renexpo Interhydro event, Mar 27-28, in Salzburg, Austria.

We'll be at the National Hydropower Association's Water Power Week in Washington, DC, Mar 31-Apr 4.

Onward to 2025!

From Halloween to New Years, we bring you these jolly group photos of some of our California-based team members.