4 ms·
> They've got egress cooling water limits of 26-30C (78-86). It's an entirely manufactured problem. > There's trivial solutions to this, but they all probably
by bananapub 4y ago
> They've got egress cooling water limits of 26-30C (78-86). It's an entirely manufactured problem.
> There's trivial solutions to this, but they all probably run into other regulatory stupidity.
> They could easily solve this just by offering giant 38-40C (100-104F) pools open to the public near their plants.
> Or, just have a parking lot sized winding halfpipe before draining into the river, or otherwise easily make up for the missing cooling tower capacity.
> In Iceland thermal plants will release boiling temperature water into rivers that didn't have it before, nobody thinks twice about it, as people are used to the natural equivalent.
> You'll want to make sure to give the fish a way out, but otherwise the only notable side effects are some algea buildup.
this will be my go-to example of how random computer programmers on HN have such profound over-confidence about things they know nothing about that their opinions on anything other than programming are actively dangerous. it is a good reminder for everyone else who still has self-awareness, though, to doubt themselves more when talking about topics they don't know anything about.
thanks!
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- avar 4y agoIf you mean the over-confidence of asserting that water you can comfortably swim in (31C / 88F) would "boil a river" as the GP did, I agree. There's been ongoing discussion about nuclear power on HN for months now in response to the Ukraine/Russia crisis. This question of French nuclear cooling keeps coming up. After mulling over it for a bit the French nuclear regulator has arrived at the solution that I'm advocating for here, i.e. deciding that perhaps it's not such a big deal that the cooling water is a bit over regulatory limits[1]. But I'll admit that I'm not too familiar with France's nuclear industry and regulator. Perhaps it's all run by over-confident computer programmers. Aside from one's own expertise it's an important skill when reading the news to try to parse out whether the latest news about the sky falling is really something to be concerned about in the longer term, or just overinflated reports about easily solved implementation details. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to work out how say having an empty pool the size of the Blue Lagoon next to a French nuclear power plant could serve as a thermal buffer on hot days. The examples of using public swimming pools adjacent to nuclear plants as thermal buffers was meant to humanize the ballpark of those numbers. 1. https://www.brusselstimes.com/256441/heat-wave-french-nuclear-plants-temporarily-allowed-to-discharge-overheated-water https://www.brusselstimes.com/256441/heat-wave-french-nuclea...