energies Article Analysis of Small Hydropower Generation Potential: (2) Future Prospect of the Potential under Climate Change Jaewon Jung 1 , Sungeun Jung 2 , Junhyeong Lee 3 , Myungjin Lee 3 and Hung Soo Kim 3, *   Citation: Jung, J.; Jung, S.; Lee, J.; Lee, M.; Kim, H.S. Analysis of Small Hydropower Generation Potential: (2) Future Prospect of the Potential under Climate Change. Energies 2021, 14, 3001. https://doi.org/10.3390/ en14113001 Academic Editor: Chirag Trivedi Received: 9 March 2021 Accepted: 9 May 2021 Published: 21 May 2021 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affil- iations. Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/). 1 Institute of Water Resources System, Inha University, Incheon 22212, Korea; jungjw89@gmail.com 2 Division of Computer Science and Engineering, Sahmyook University, Seoul 139742, Korea; sejung@syu.ac.kr 3 Department of Civil Engineering, Inha University, Incheon 22212, Korea; lee_junhyeong@naver.com (J.L.); lmj3544@naver.com (M.L.) * Correspondence: sookim@inha.ac.kr Abstract: The interest in renewable energy to replace fossil fuel is increasing as the problem caused by climate change has become more severe. In this study, small hydropower (SHP) was evaluated as a resource with high development value because of its high energy density compared to other re- newable energy sources. SHP may be an attractive and sustainable power generation environmental perspective because of its potential to be found in small rivers and streams. The power generation potential could be estimated based on the discharge in the river basin. Since the river discharge de- pends on the climate conditions, the hydropower generation potential changes sensitively according to climate variability. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the SHP potential in consideration of future climate change. In this study, the future prospect of SHP potential is simulated for the period of 2021 to 2100 considering the climate change in three hydropower plants of Deoksong, Hanseok, and Socheon stations, Korea. The results show that SHP potential for the near future (2021 to 2040) shows a tendency to be increased, and the highest increase is 23.4% at the Deoksong SPH plant. Through the result of future prospect, we have shown that hydroelectric power generation capacity or SHP potential will be increased in the future. Therefore, we believe that it is necessary to revitalize the development of SHP to expand the use of renewable energy. In addition, a methodology presented in this study could be used for the future prospect of the SHP potential. Keywords: climate change scenario; generation potential; hydropower; renewable energy 1. Introduction With accelerating climate change, leading countries have established long-term plans to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and have attempted to implement such plans. To this end, they are implementing energy transition policies according to their own economic interests to ultimately reduce carbon emissions by migrating from fossil energy to renewable energy. In this situation, small hydropower (SHP), which is clean energy that uses water, is a representative renewable energy source that is sustainable even in future climate change because it reduces carbon emissions [1,2]. Thus far, the value of SHP has been relatively underestimated due its initial investment cost being high compared to other energy sources with technical development. However, the development of SHP will gradually be expanded in the future as renewable energy sources are attracting global attention [3,4]. Therefore, reliable data for selecting promising candidate sites for SHP, such as on the estimation of the available power generation potential, are important. However, SHP is sensitive to climate conditions because it generates power using the head of flowing water. In recent years, the occurrence frequency of abnormal climate, such as droughts and floods, has been slowly increasing due to climate change. This change also has a direct impact on the amount of power generated by the operation of SHP plants [5–7]. Many studies have been conducted to estimate the SHP potential under climate change (discussed in the next chapter). Nevertheless, few studies have been conducted on the Energies 2021, 14, 3001. https://doi.org/10.3390/en14113001 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/energies