Thirsty electric cars, sweeping it under the carpet

Electric cars are thought to be a solution to our fossil fuel problems, but the electricity that powers these cars still must be generated somewhere. A March 10 article on LiveScience.com says "Electric Vehicles Could Strain Water Supplies." This is because it can take a lot of water to cool power plants.

According to article, a mechanical engineer at the University of Texas in Austin, named Michael Webber and a colleague did research on water usage. They compared the amount of water consumed during petroleum refining and electricity generation in the United States. For each mile driven, electricity could demand roughly 3 times more water than gasoline. I wonder if these figures take into account electric cars often being lighter than the average car?

A lot of power plants burn fossil fuel and then use tons of water to cool the turbines. This often just vents out a cooling tower.

Pictured here is the steam plume from a power plant and cooling tower on Bellingham's waterfront. This plume made a neat picture one morning walking through town.

I don't mind living near industrial things as they can make something called "found art." The art that's not necessarily intended as art which is found in everyday life.

One way to get more value from power plants is to reuse the waste heat in other things. The Bellingham plant was built as a co-generation facility to provide steam for Georgia Pacific's pulp and paper mills.

Now that Georgia Pacific is closed, what will happen to the extra steam?

New development is planned on the waterfront and this extra heat could be used, even in space heating. I'm not sure what the plans will be.

Co-generation requires other uses to be located close to the power plant. Basically it's people living and / or working in close proximity to power plants. Co-generation provides more bang for the cooling water buck.

It seems like most folks just want to sweep things under the carpet, so to speak. Drive a car that appears clean, plug it in and then have the power plant in some other neighborhood.

Wind and solar energy can use less cooling water, but some people don't wish to see windmills. Solar farms can take lots of space.

Then there's riding a bicycle, which I thoroughly enjoy. This can require living close to things, like power plants.