Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Academics and politicians have grouped the two resources under a single rubric: the
water-energynexus.he term makes sense in theory, but in practice, the federal gov-
ernment has split the management of water and power among different agencies, which
has led to confusion. When not handled carefully, the water-energy nexus turns into a
vicious cycle of rising energy demand, dropping water supplies, and environmental de-
gradation—known as the water-energy collision.
Environmental groups have seized on water as a powerful weapon to challenge the per-
mitting of power plants. In 2004, Riverkeeper and six states sued the EPA for permit-
ting once-through cooling in about five hundred older power plants across the country,
charging that the inefficient process violates the Clean Water Act by harming aquatic
life and failing to utilize the best technology available. The case, which could signific-
antly affect the energy industry, was sent to the US Supreme Court in 2009.
In the spring of 2010, New York State refused to renew the permit for the Indian
Point nuclear plant, which sits on the Hudson River, because its cooling towers used so
much water, 2.5 billion gallons a day, and released it back into the river at such high
temperatures that it was decimating aquatic life. Company officials said it would cost
$1 billion to install a less harmful cooling system (environmentalists say it would cost
far less) and would force them to raise electrical rates. But the state's refusal to renew
Indian Point's permit was hardly a surprise. The EPA had first told the company in 1975
that it would have to replace its cooling system, and the plant's Clean Water Act per-
mits expired in the 1990s. Politicians were loath to take on the power industry, and so,
apparently, were regulators. For years, a series of interim agreements, licensing delays,
and other obfuscations allowed Indian Point, and other power plants, to keep operating
with outdated equipment.
In the meantime, new, far more efficient “closed loop” cooling technology is avail-
able. Instead of using huge amounts of water once and dumping it into waterways, the
new system uses smaller amounts of water and recirculates it through cooling towers or
ponds several times, which reduces evaporation and the discharge of heated water. In
2008, Pacific Gas & Electric opened the first closed-loop power plant in Antioch, Cali-
fornia, and it cut water intake from 40,000 gallons a minute to 1.6 gallons a minute.
As our need, or desire, for energy mounts this century, new methods of extracting
natural gas and oil promise to unlock previously unattainable resources and could prove
a huge boon that will power the nation into the twenty-second century. But these tech-
niques require vast quantities of water, are dirty, and come with numerous costs.
Extraction methods such as hydrofracking and retorting represent the next phase of
the water-energy nexus and collision. They will force us to make difficult choices about
Search WWH ::




Custom Search