Regional water consumption for hydro and thermal electricity generation in the United States

Journal Article · Thu May 18 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · Applied Energy

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2017.05.025· OSTI ID:1427501

Lee, Uisung ^[1]; Han, Jeongwoo ^[1]; Elgowainy, Amgad ^[1]; Wang, Michael ^[1]

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1. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Energy Systems Division

Water is an essential resource for most electric power generation technologies. Thermal power plants typically require a large amount of cooling water whose evaporation is regarded to be consumed. Hydropower plants result in evaporative water loss from the large surface areas of the storing reservoirs. This paper estimated the regional water consumption factors (WCFs) for thermal and hydro electricity generation in the United States, because the WCFs of these power plants vary by region and water supply and demand balance are of concern in many regions. For hydropower, total WCFs were calculated using a reservoir’s surface area, state-level water evaporation, and background evapotranspiration. Then, for a multipurpose reservoir, a fraction of its WCF was allocated to hydropower generation based on the share of the economic valuation of hydroelectricity among benefits from all purposes of the reservoir. For thermal power plants, the variations in WCFs by type of cooling technology, prime mover technology, and by region were addressed. The results show that WCFs for electricity generation vary significantly by region. Finally, the generation-weighted average WCFs of thermoelectricity and hydropower are 1.25 (range of 0.18–2.0) and 16.8 (range of 0.67–1194) L/kWh, respectively, and the generation-weighted average WCF by the U.S. generation mix in 2015 is estimated at 2.18 L/kWh.

• Research Organization: Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE); USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Fuel Cell Technologies Office (EE-3F); USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Vehicle Technologies Office (EE-3V)
• Grant/Contract Number: AC02-06CH11357
• OSTI ID: 1427501
• Alternate ID(s): OSTI ID: 22764685; OSTI ID: 1495522
• Journal Information: Applied Energy, Journal Name: Applied Energy Vol. 210; ISSN 0306-2619
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

13 HYDRO ENERGY
32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
allocation
hydropower
life-cycle analysis
regional analysis
thermoelectricity
water consumption factor