High head power plants work with reservoirs, which can be natural or artificial. These power plants use the potential energy of the water. The falling height of high head power plants is between 100 and 1500 meters.

For example some high head power plants use a valley as reservoir. At the entry of the valley a dam is built. These power plants have their turbines at the bottom of the dam.

Another kind of high head power plants use reservoirs in the mountains. The turbines, which are placed downhill, are connected to the reservoir with long pipelines.