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We put the plant near a river. It intakes river water, which is heated to steam to make the electricity, and is then cooled and reused or released. I don't see
by jimhefferon 7y ago
We put the plant near a river. It intakes river water, which is heated to steam to make the electricity, and is then cooled and reused or released. I don't see how that is terrifically destructive; I must be missing something. Explain it to me, please? (Serious question.)
- epistasis 7y agoImagine that we decide to increase energy usage by 5x-10x, and increase size of the plant, and the change in river eater temperature goes up by that much. Eventually the plant starts to change the river water temperature to the degree that it changes the ecosystem. This is already regulated, see for example this discussion of monitoring systems for proving compliance: https://www.power-eng.com/articles/2007/01/external-temperature-monitoring-for-power-plants.html https://www.power-eng.com/articles/2007/01/external-temperat...
- SECProto 7y agoHow do you cool it down? The only way to cool one thing is to heat another. Evaporative cooling is usually the method if you must cool your water, but it has diminishing returns and isn't practical to cool all the way to inlet temperature (because source water is colder than the air wet-bulb temperature). This results in water above ambient being discharged to the environment, which affects fish and plant life in the water body.
- jhayward 7y agoWe already do that, and those nuclear power plants (and other thermal plants) already have to shut down under certain climate conditions to avoid damaging the local ecosystem by overheating it. [1] [1] https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2012-08-20-ct-met-nuclear-water-20120820-story.html https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2012-08-20-ct-met...