U.S. Geological Survey Circular 745 by Giusti and Meyer reported in 1977 that about 63 percent of the energy input to a nuclear powerplant [of the 1977 vintage] is discharged as heat to the cooling water system. Published data show that estimated water consumption varies with the cooling system adopted, being least in oncethrough cooling (about 18 cubic feet per second per 1,000 megawatts electrical) and greatest in closed cooling with mechanical draft towers (about 30 cubic feet per second per 1,000 megawatts electrical). When freshwater is used, this large variation carries important implications to the regional water resources economy in view of the increasingly keen competition for water.
Thus the authors concluded that there was an urgent need to verify these findings with measurements. The critical need for cooling water at all times by the nuclear powerplant industry, coupled with the knowledge that water withdrawal in the basin will generally increase with time and will be at a maximum during low-flow periods, indicates a need for reexamination of the design low flow currently adopted and the methods used to estimate it. In particular there is a need to develop models which account and evaluate low flows in terms of the ground-water inflow to the river basin network, the evapotranspiration from the basin, and the basinwide water consumption by humans.
The amount of power generated, the name of the cooling water source, and the cooling method adopted for all nuclear powerplants projected to be in operation by 1985 in the United States are tabulated and the estimated annual evaporation at each powerplant site is shown on a map of the conterminous United States. Another map is presented that shows all nuclear powerplants located on river sites as well as stream reaches in the United States where the 7-day, 10-year low flow is at least 300 cubic feet per second or where this amount of flow can be developed with storage.
[It would be wise of the USGS to update this report ...]
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