MINT & BRICS |
Belo Monte dam on the Xingu River in Brazil. Image: PARALAXIS/
Shutterstock.com
References
GlobalData (2025). Brazil Power Outlook, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, March 2025.
GlobalData (2025). China Power Outlook, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, July 2025.
GlobalData (2025). India Power Outlook, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, August 2025.
GlobalData (2026). Russia Power Outlook, Update 2026: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, January 2026.
GlobalData (2025). Mexico Power Market Outlook to 2035, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, 2025.
GlobalData (2025). Indonesia Power Market Outlook to 2035, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, 2025.
GlobalData (2025). Nigeria Power Market Outlook to 2035, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, 2025.
GlobalData (2025). Turkey Power Outlook, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, March 2025.
GlobalData (2025). South Africa Power Market Outlook to 2035, Update 2025: Market Trends, Regulations and Competitive Landscape. Power Industry Report, November 2025.
receive around $2bn in investment, aimed at sustaining reliability and adapting infrastructure to shifting energy export dynamics. Geopolitical pressures and sanctions, including restricted access to foreign technology and financing, further reinforce the emphasis on domestic modernisation over expansion. Russia presents targeted opportunities in efficiency upgrades, grid integration improvements, and pumped storage enhancements within a tightly controlled, state- driven environment.
India
India’s electricity sector combines rapid demand growth with ambitious decarbonisation targets, positioning hydropower as both a stability mechanism and investment opportunity. Large hydro represented 7.9% of installed capacity in 2024, with small hydro and pumped storage each contributing around 0.9%. While modest compared with coal or solar, hydro’s strategic value lies in balancing India’s expanding renewable fleet. Accelerating wind and solar deployment has increased demand for dispatchable resources and storage, boosting interest in pumped hydro. Hydropower is expected to receive 7.5% of sector investment between 2025 and 2030, part of a projected $267.7bn total power-sector spend. Funding will support both new capacity and modernisation of existing assets. Hydro also plays a regional role, underpinning cross-
border electricity trade with Bhutan and Nepal and strengthening supply stability. Electricity consumption is projected to rise from about 1,418 TWh in 2024 to over 2,100TWh by 2030, driven by urbanisation, industrial growth, and electrification. Meeting this demand sustainably requires flexible renewable support assets, reinforcing hydro’s role as a system enabler. Challenges persist, including land acquisition hurdles, permitting delays, and grid bottlenecks. Nonetheless, hydro’s capacity to stabilise a rapidly evolving renewable system ensures its continued strategic importance..
China
China’s power system – the largest globally – presents a hydropower narrative defined by scale and integration. Large hydro accounted for 8.7% of installed capacity in 2024, alongside 2.6% small hydro and 1.8% pumped storage. Hydropower sits within a vast renewable portfolio, with total renewables representing 46.1% of capacity under China’s decarbonisation strategy. Its role is multifaceted. Renewable expansion has
created excess coal capacity in some regions, prompting restrictions on new coal construction. Hydropower thus functions as both generation supply and a transition catalyst supporting reduced coal reliance. Market mechanisms such as green power trading allow users to procure hydroelectricity directly or via certificates, while
36 | February/March 2026 |
www.waterpowermagazine.com
cross-provincial trading helps balance resource-rich and demand-intensive areas. Electricity demand continues to outpace GDP growth, driven by manufacturing, electrification, and digital infrastructure. Hydropower’s flexibility and storage capacity are critical for integrating expanding solar and wind capacity. Grid constraints remain a challenge, with transmission limitations delaying some projects. However, continued smart-grid investment and infrastructure upgrades signal deeper hydro integration. For the global hydropower industry, China offers opportunities in advanced turbines, pumped storage expansion, and digital control systems for ultra-large grid operations.
South Africa South Africa presents a distinct hydropower narrative: rather than serving as a central generation pillar, hydro plays a small but strategically important role focused on storage, system balancing, and regional cooperation. In 2024, coal accounted for roughly 66.7% of installed capacity, while large hydropower represented about 0.9% and pumped storage 4%. This limited domestic share reflects structural constraints. Low rainfall and recurring droughts restrict large-scale hydro expansion, and capacity has remained around 0.6 GW since 2020, with no major additions planned through 2035. Generation from large hydro and pumped storage is projected to remain broadly stable over the next decade. Hydropower’s importance, however, lies in system functionality rather than output. Pumped storage is a critical component of national energy strategy, helping manage supply–demand fluctuations and stabilise a grid facing reliability challenges, aging infrastructure, and increasing renewable penetration. As solar and wind deployment accelerates under the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Programme, the need for flexibility resources continues to grow. Regional interconnection further enhances hydro’s
strategic relevance. South Africa has long relied on imports from Mozambique’s Cahora Bassa scheme and participates actively in the Southern African Power Pool, exporting 13.5TWh and importing 9.8TWh in 2024. Policy frameworks reinforce hydro’s supplementary role: the Integrated Resource Plan targets 2,500 MW of additional hydro capacity by 2030, largely through imports and regional collaboration rather than domestic dam construction. For hydropower stakeholders, South Africa represents
a market defined less by new large-scale generation and more by pumped-storage optimisation, asset modernisation, and cross-border integration –positioning hydro as essential enabling infrastructure in a system gradually transitioning away from coal.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45
