1 reply to this topic

[E3 wise]

http://www.miamihera...to-operate.html

  Florida Power and Light may operate cooling canals around Turkey Point at higher temperatures, nuclear regulators say, despite a festering algae bloom that has clogged the waterway, made water hotter and threatened to shut down two reactors.

  Cooling the nuclear reactors in southern Miami-Dade County with hotter water from the canal won’t pose a risk to safety or harm the environment, the regulators said in response to an application from the utility last month to increase water temperatures to 104 degrees. Several times this summer, with power demand high, FPL reported that canal water approached or exceeded a 100-degree limit, which requires the reactors to be shut down.

   FPL has asked the state to revise water guidelines, allowing it draw millions of gallons from the Floridan aquifer to cool the canals. The fresher water is also needed to prevent spiraling salinity levels that are feeding the algae bloom and worsening the threat of saltwater intrusion into drinking water supplies.

   A draft order would allow 14 million gallons of water a day to be pumped from the Floridan. The order would also revise an extensive monitoring program put in place prior to the power plant expansion to track changes. State and county regulators as well as officials with the South Florida Water Management District are scheduled to go over the draft order on Friday, Division of Environmental Resources Management spokesman Luis Espinoza said.

  FPL has asked the state to revise water guidelines, allowing it draw millions of gallons from the Floridan aquifer to cool the canals. The fresher water is also needed to prevent spiraling salinity levels that are feeding the algae bloom and worsening the threat of saltwater intrusion into drinking water supplies.

  A draft order would allow 14 million gallons of water a day to be pumped from the Floridan. The order would also revise an extensive monitoring program put in place prior to the power plant expansion to track changes. State and county regulators as well as officials with the South Florida Water Management District are scheduled to go over the draft order on Friday, Division of Environmental Resources Management spokesman Luis Espinoza said.

  FPL has consistently said increasing power at the plant has not raised water temperatures in the canals, which act as a radiator, cooling reactors by circulating water around the cores then letting the water cool as it moves across 168 miles of shallow waterways over two days before re-entering the reactors.

But some scientists are skeptical.

  “That doesn’t seem credible at all,” said David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer and director of the Nuclear Safety Project for the Union of Concerned Scientists. “Nuclear power plants are only 33 percent efficient. Only one third goes out on the wires. The other two-thirds must be released to the environment as waste heat. That’s why all these plants are built next to large bodies of water.”

  Before the expansion, which added 15 percent more capacity, biologists and environmentalists raised concerns, triggering the extensive monitoring plan that they now warn is in jeopardy.

“We want them to freshen the canals, but at what cost?” said Tropical Audubon’s Reynolds, who worried that changes are being made too quickly. “It’s clear that in the guise of an emergency, we’re heading down the wrong road.”

  From E3Wise
  So FPL is trading 12 million gallons of water a day for power.  Just par for the course I guess after you read this.

  The worst-ranked utilities for clean energy

http://www.utilitydi...hx8D5J20.mailto

  Utilities from the Southeast are deploying the least renewables and energy efficiency. \For the five lowest ranked utilities for renewables -- SCANA, Southern Company, Dominion Resources, AES and Entergy -- renewable energy sales accounted for less than 2% of each of their total retail electricity sales for the year. Compare that to highest utilites for whom renewables accounted for approximately 17-21% of their retail electricity sales in 2012.

The same goes for energy efficiency. The lowest-ranked companies were Public Service Enterprise Group, SCANA, Florida Power & Light, Pepco Holdings, Dominion Resources, Entergy and Southern Company – many of the same companies that ranked toward the bottom for renewables.

From E3Wise
So for us here in South Florida nuclear power means a whole lot less water and almost no renewable, pretty depressing.

[Shortpoet-GTD]