Assessment of waste heat management issues

Abstract

The Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972 (P.L. 92-500) defined the discharge of cooling water, e.g. from once-through power plant cooling systems, into natural water bodies as a form of pollution. Furthermore, P.L. 92-500 directed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to develop a policy for controlling this "pollution" with "best available technology economically achievable" by 1983 for old sources and with "best available demonstrated control technology" taking "into consideration the cost of achieving such effluent reduction, and any non-water quality environmental impact and energy requirement" for new sources. In addition, the law provided for special exemptions, Section 316(a), from these regulations for waste heat sources which could show that they have had or will have no appreciable effect on the ecology of the water body. The purposes of this project element are (a) to assess present EPA policy and administrative actions regarding waste heat management and (b) to determine if this policy is really protecting the aquatic environment with the least possible increase in other social costs, including energy use, pollution in other media, and administrative effort.