Reply To: Nuplex.

[Aeronaut]

JimmyT wrote:

In depth thread.

In light of this website post, can we come up with a chart comparing the heat and thermal pollution footprint for different energy production processes?

Given that

Almost half of all water withdrawn in the United States each year is for cooling electric power plants.

It would be nice to add a quantification/estimate of how much less thermal pollution will be generated by FF plants. That seems to be one area where we are still polluting.

Perhaps this should be a separate thread.

Whoever originated that statement about cooling water use clearly has some sort of agenda other than stating the simple truth. (And I know you’re just quoting someone, Rezwan) It is so misleading and carefully crafted as to force me to that conclusion.

The truth:
Almost half of all water withdrawn in the United States each year is for cooling electric power plants. And the vast majority of that water is simply raised a couple of degrees and returned to the river or lake whence it originated. There have been environmental impact studies ad-nauseum which show that very little if any harm is done to the ecology in the process.

Notice that the statement is not untrue. You can’t say that about it. But it sure misrepresents reality.

Jimmy, the article I quoted (not one of it’s sources, who likely does have an agenda), also states that agriculture, industry, and the electric industry are the US’s largest water users in that order. This is a VERY long, multi-faceted article that makes the point that no single industry or resource can be singled out by policy. Rather, water, air, energy, transportation, (just for openers) should be planned in an integrated manner.

The FF Society has already demonstrated more due diligence than a “flat-worlder” envirocrises monger will ever show. I agree, we need a thread to explore how to minimize our exposure to them, without painting the last 110 years as bad. Hey, they did what they could with what they had.