According to the paper (https://arxiv.org/pdf/2304.03271 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2304.03271), the vast majority of water usage is not from cooling but indirectly

According to the paper (https://arxiv.org/pdf/2304.03271 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2304.03271), the vast majority of water usage is not from cooling but indirectly from energy usage. The paper in turn gets its electricity water intensity from: https://www.wsp.com/-/media/insights/us/documents/wp_guidance-for-calculating-water-use-embedded.pdf https://www.wsp.com/-/media/insights/us/documents/wp_guidanc... (reference [20]) - which notes: > Even though hydropower water withdrawal and consumption intensities are usually orders of magnitude larger than other types and likely to skew overall regional averages, it is important to include hydropower in the factors to show not only the power sector’s dependency on water but also its vulnerability to water shortages. Some people have pointed out that using water for cooling does not destroy it - it'll all rain back down. I think it would've still been fair to consider how much processed/drinking water was being evaporated, since it'd need processing again, but I can't really see the justification for the article's framing when the figure is measuring water that would've just flowed into the sea had the hydroelectric dam not been there.