Novel methodology for evaluating economic feasibility of low-water cooling technology retrofits at power plants
Novel methodology for evaluating economic feasibility of low-water cooling technology retrofits at power plants
复制标题
评估发电厂低水冷却技术改造经济可行性的新方法
DOI：
10.2166/wp.2012.018
复制
发表时间：
2013
期刊：
影响因子：
1.6
通讯作者：
M. Webber
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
A. Stillwell;M. Webber
对水供应的需求不断增加--人口和经济增长以及不稳定的流量要求已经使水供应紧张--意味着许多地区正在考虑保护和重新分配水资源以满足其需求。增加水供应的一种方法是通过热电厂的低水冷却技术。冷却塔、干湿混合冷却系统和干式冷却系统减少了发电厂的用水量和对环境的影响，但需要额外的资本和运营支出。这些费用可以通过新的冷却技术提供的租赁水权的收入和抗旱能力的额外好处来抵消。因此，冷却技术改造被认为是提高干旱恢复能力和支持瞬时流量的具有成本效益的机会。为了验证这一假设，我们开发了一种新的方法来评估干旱弹性的经济和技术性能参数的函数。使用基于流域的水资源模型的39个得克萨斯州的发电厂，我们说明了这种方法来确定改造替代冷却技术的可行性。在目前的资本成本和水价下，在三个设施中，转向替代冷却技术在经济上是合理的。更高的水价，加上水供应的更高波动性，可能会使未来更多的发电厂采用低水冷却技术在经济上可行。
Increasing demand on water supplies – already strained by population and economic growth and instream flow requirements – means many areas are considering conservation and reallocation to meet their needs. One method of increasing water availability is through low-water cooling technologies at thermoelectric power plants. Cooling towers, hybrid wet–dry and dry cooling systems reduce water requirements and the environmental impact at power plants but require additional capital and operating expenditure. These expenses can be offset with revenue from leasing water rights made available by new cooling technologies and the added benefit of drought resiliency. Thus, cooling technology retrofits are hypothesized as cost-effective opportunities for increasing drought resiliency and supporting instream flows. To test this hypothesis, we developed a novel methodology for evaluating drought resiliency as a function of economic and technical performance parameters. Using a river basin-based water resources model of 39 Texas power plants, we illustrate this methodology to determine the feasibility of retrofitting alternative cooling technologies. At current capital costs and water prices, switching to alternative cooling technologies is economically justifiable today at three facilities. Higher water prices, coupled with higher volatility in water availability, will be likely to make low-water cooling technologies economically viable at more power plants in the future.