4 ms·
I'm surprised to see that this project uses wet cooling. Wikipedia claims it uses at least twice as much water as a coal power plant of similar capacity. Is wa
by 0xffff2 11y ago
I'm surprised to see that this project uses wet cooling. Wikipedia claims it uses at least twice as much water as a coal power plant of similar capacity.
Is water surprisingly abundant in this part of the Sahara?
- groby_b 11y agoNext to a sizeable lake: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ouarzazate+45000,+Morocco/@30.9189624,-6.9769893,12.89z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0xdbb104077422057:0x26b3cb529b37ab00 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ouarzazate+45000,+Morocco/... Out of curiosity - what are the options outside of wet cooling?
- _-__--- 11y agoalso, what can be done with the hot water coming out of the system?
- semi-extrinsic 11y agoBy definition this is low grade heat. In cold climates that can be used for stuff like heating nearby homes. In hot climates you're basically limited to running it through a bottoming cycle [1]. But that needs a delta T between the hot water coming out of your cooling system and ambient temperature of probably about 40 K, which probably requires a bigger cooling system than otherwise. So you have the added investment cost of a bigger cooling system plus the bottoming cycle, but you've gained some more energy output. Is it worth it? Impossible to say without crunching the specific numbers. But my first guess is "no" in this case. It is usually worth it for gas fired powerplants though. [1] Covered in https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combined_cycle https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combined_cycle
- david-given 11y agoIf your ambient temperature is 40 K, I submit that you are not human and are, in fact, living on Pluto. Did you mean Fahrenheit?
- Blaque 11y agoHe's talking about a difference of 40K between the hot water out of the cooling and the ambient temperature.
- semi-extrinsic 11y agoYes, exactly. Thanks for clarifying for me.
- david-given 11y agoOh, I see! I hadn't twigged. ...shame; living on Pluto would be cool.
- semi-extrinsic 11y agoTIL: "twigged". And yeah, living on Pluto would no doubt be... cool. puts on sunglasses
- m0skit0 11y agoOuarzazate has a pretty big dam nearby. Also Ouarzazate is technically not Sahara yet.