At least with existing nuclear power plants, they are susceptible to climate change issues ironically. In Europe this year several of them had to be shut down or run on partial capacity due to insufficient water supply for their operation.
I'm not sure if that is down to the specific implementation assuming Europe's traditionally plentiful water availability in those regions, or if it is a more general technical issue of nuclear power plants.
To the best of my knowledge, the same issue should also affect any other power plant that uses water avaporation to turn turbines, which would include at least coal; I am not entirely sure about gas.
The nuclear plant I live near uses sea water for its outer cooling loop. Now you can't do that everywhere but by the time the Atlantic dries up, we all will be long gone.
Don't you need to desalinate? Or how does that work? I mean, datacenters could also use sea-water, but I'm pretty sure the reason they don't do it had something to do with material degradation from salt-water.
Edit: I don't think you need to desalinate. So yes, seriously curious why sea water isn't used more often for the outer loop. I remember watching a video about it, but I can't find it right now.
I imagine desalinization would be necessary at some stage. If not to protect the radiators (can you make them from something that doesn't corrode in salt water, or coat them in it?) then because as the heated water evaporates, the salt will remain. At minimum when they're moving the 'used' water back to the ocean its salinity will be higher, which might cause localized ecological impact, and probably measures would need to be put in place to prevent salt deposits in the towers.
Evaporative cooling isn't always used. It makes sense when you have limited access to coolant, this need every bit of cooling power per unit of water, or if the water system is overly sensitive to temperature rise, but can afford the evapirative losses. If you have so much water (such as a significant river, or a literal ocean), then evaporative cooling doesn't make as much sense.
When you're talking about a literal ocean full of water, it makes no sense to include evaporative cooling in the loop.
Fresh water boils,
Fresh water steam turn turbine
Fresh water steam enters condenser room
Condenser room has many tubes
It’s collected and re pumped to be re heated
Loop B sea water in, and out
Sea water pumped in,
They travel through those sealed tubes
It’s pumped out
The downside is the tubes are made of either titanium or high grade steel, which is much more corrosive resistant but also stupid expensive
The water itself exits at most 8-12*C higher into the sea which is… not a lot even for the local area since the sea is so massive it dissipates rather quickly
I wonder about that last point. We've had more than one plant get the EPA running in after they started destroying local aquatic life in smaller rivers and streams. Wouldn't surprise me if the volume plus temp differential is large enough to cause damage over time. Of course I hope not though
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u/R3D3-1 Sep 13 '26
At least with existing nuclear power plants, they are susceptible to climate change issues ironically. In Europe this year several of them had to be shut down or run on partial capacity due to insufficient water supply for their operation.
I'm not sure if that is down to the specific implementation assuming Europe's traditionally plentiful water availability in those regions, or if it is a more general technical issue of nuclear power plants.
To the best of my knowledge, the same issue should also affect any other power plant that uses water avaporation to turn turbines, which would include at least coal; I am not entirely sure about gas.