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Power Plant Heating
Name: Jim
Status: Student
Age: 20s
Location: N/A
Country: N/A
Date: N/A
Question:
I am searching for data concerning thermal pollution via
heat rejection by a power plant into a) air and b) water and its effects
on animal/plant life. If any links to related sites can be given, it
would be GREATLY appreciated. Basically, we have to design a theoretical
power plant and I need to know what, if any, regulations have been set
concerning the most heat that can be rejected by law into a river or lake
or surrounding air so that we can set upper limits on heat
rejection. This effects calculations within the actual plant (a simple
vapor power cycle if anyone cares). If the response can be emailed, it
would be greatly appreciated. Thank You.
Replies:
Dear Jim--I can only give you some ideas for related links as I have some
project deadlines to meet today and I do not have any current technical data
at my finger tips. It appears from your e-mail address that you may be at
Penn State Univ. If that is correct, you are in luck as you have a very good
nuclear engineering dept. at PSU (if there is a Mr. Edward Klevans still at
PSU,he was the student branch faculty advisor to the ANS (see below)). You
also have several nuclear power plants in your state and can get heat
related environmental data from the utilities running the plants (like PECO
Energy, GPU, Pennsylvania Power & Light, etc.). I know you did not specify
what type of plant you are talking about, but heat rejection from a fossil
or a nuclear plant still produces waste heat along the lines of your
question.The most efficient nuclear plant still only has an overall heat
cycle efficiency of about 33%, which means the plant is rejecting about 67%
of its heat load to the atmosphere. I do not remember the corresponding
efficiency for a typical fossil plant. You can go to a basic nuclear
engineering text (like Introduction to Nuclear Engineering by John Lamarsh
or Nuclear Engineering by Duderstadt and Hamilton) for some information on
heat rejection from the thermo cycle in the plant.
If you go to the environmental section of the Final Safety Analysis Report
(FSAR) for any nuclear plant, you should find information about the waste
heat discharged to the atmosphere from the plant. This data determines the
amount of cooling water required for the plant and factors into the need for
passive or active heat exchangers (like cooling towers, etc.) that the plant
will require to meet Federal and state environmental requirements.
Links you can try are the library of your nuclear engineering department at
the university, the HQs and regional offices of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (www.nrc.gov), the U.S. EPA (www.epa.gov), the American Nuclear
Society (ANS) (www.ans.org), and the Electric Power Research Institute (in
Palo Alto, CA). You should also consult your state environmental regulatory
office (you can find it on the web under state government for your state)
for their regulations on discharge heat requirements for industrial
facilities.
I cannot give you more specific information at this time without doing some
research of my own, but my workload this week simply will not allow it, I am
sorry. You will have to use the links I have provided and go from there, but
we did the same thing when we were in school. I hope this information helps
you a little.
Regards,
John S.
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Update: June 2012
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