Climate Forced Hydropower Simulations for Africa Using NASA NEX-GDDP

African hydropower simulations for 87 power plants across 27 countries and five power pools. The dataset contains results from climate model simulations forced by NASA's NEX-GDDP dataset, covering a retrospective period (1950-2005) and two future scenarios (RCP 4.5 and 8.5). This work is based on a forthcoming publication by researchers from Carnegie Mellon University.

Use Cases

• Assessing climate resilience of hydropower capacity based on future temperature and precipitation scenarios.
• Comparing projected hydropower usable capacity across different African power pools.
• Analyzing the impact of different Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP 4.5 and 8.5) on energy resources.
• Modeling long-term energy supply under climate change using outputs from 21 Global Climate Models.

Strengths

• Covers 87 hydropower plants across 27 African countries, providing a continental-scale view.
• Uses a detailed climate forcing dataset (NASA NEX-GDDP) with 21 Global Climate Models.
• Includes simulations for a long historical baseline (1950-2005) and two future climate scenarios (RCP 4.5 and 8.5).
• Provides a dedicated PDF file describing all information included in the dataset.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.

Provenance

Source

Carnegie Mellon University, based on NASA NEX-GDDP climate projections.

Collection Method

Simulation results from climate-forced hydropower modeling.

Time Range

1950-2005 (historical), plus future projections under RCP scenarios.

Geography

Africa, specifically 27 countries across five continental power pools.