(53c) Utilization of Municipal Wastewater for Cooling System In Thermoelectric Power Production

The thermoelectric power industry in the US uses a large amount of fresh water. As the availability of freshwater becomes increasingly limited, alternative sources of water for power plant cooling are of interest for both existing and future power plants. Potential non-traditional water sources for use in thermoelectric power production include municipal wastewater, produced water from oil and gas extraction, mine drainage, and water produced from carbon sequestration. Utilization of impaired water requires evaluation of the deleterious effects on the cooling system and necessary treatments with consideration for quality and abundance of the impaired water source.

This paper addresses the development of a software module in Aspen plus^® to identify and evaluate water management and treatment processes required for using municipal wastewater in thermoelectric power production inorder to reduce freshwater use. Establishment of the initial framework to model and simulate recirculating cooling system, treatment processes, and chemical equilibrium will be discussed. This framework will enable the end user to perform sizing, costing, and optimization analysis. The effect of different water properties on the selection and configuration of treatment processes, as well as performance of the main condenser and cooling water cycle, will be addressed. Finally, a costing analysis for two scenarios considering water of different qualities will be presented.