*5.4. Hydropower Systems*

In Poland, compared to other countries, the use of the water energy potential is incomparably lower, which is primarily due to the climatic conditions, average rainfall, and topography. Traditional hydroelectric power plants could be built in places with large natural slopes or where water could be artificially dammed. Hydropower systems require high initial investment costs (mainly due to construction costs). It was estimated that the share of hydropower in primary energy was about 1.5%. Poland's hydropower resources alone are estimated at 13.7 TWh per year. If it were possible to fully use Poland's hydropower systems potential, it would be possible to achieve even ca. 11 GW of capacity in big, and ca. 1.2 GW in small and medium, hydropower plants. In 2020, there were only 18 hydroelectric plants in the country with more than 5 MW.

The conclusion from the weighted SWOT matrix for the hydropower systems in Poland (Table 6) was also quite optimistic. The IFR was above 1–1.45, meaning that the strengths were more critical than weaknesses. The opportunities to threats ratio was 0.98, which means that the hydropower systems' development perspectives are not favorable because of extreme dependence on political decisions. The balance between the IFR and EFR was 1.45:0.98. This means a favorable situation because strengths and opportunities are more critical than weaknesses and threats. The things that Polish policymakers should do are to manage the potential resistance of society and to promote the building of microto medium hydropower power stations primarily in the places where watermills operated over 100 years ago.
