The Cour

Its a funny name for a river when you stop and think of it; not the River Cour or the Cour Burn just "The Cour".

We were organised and out early for Caley's Saturday morning walk; under way shortly after 9 am.
Despite apperances here, the Cour has a large catchment draining virtually all of the northern slopes of the Grey Corries mountain range. That it isn't higher today (the river level) is that its main tributaries are intercepted by hydro electric intake structures. Built in an era when compensation flow" wasn't recognised very little water gets past the intakes until there is a rain storm.

It makes for an interesting backdrop for this Caley picture, 

*Compensation flow, modern schemes are designed with regard to the environment of the "depleted reach" where the river system must remain wetted even if at the expense of the turbine standing silent. On run of river schemes the percentage of the time the turbine generates is known as the "Load Factor". There is an engineering and commercial frustration when such a scheme has say a 30% LF yet when it rains heavy and the scheme is generating full pelt it is spilling perhaps 10 times more water that can be utilised by the turbine and pipe. When its gone its gone. The obvious solution is to build a dam and create storage but this incurs more cost and another level of legislation to comply with.