Analysis of potential implementation levels for waste heat utilization in the nuclear power industry

An assessment of land available at nuclear power stations was performed in an effort to determine the limitations land availability would impose on the implementation of reject heat utilization systems. A waste heat utilization factor was defined for all operating and planned nuclear power stations for which a Preliminary Safety Analysis Report has been filed. This factor is the percentage of the station's reject heat that could be utilized on the land available for such use at the site. The results indicate that reject heat from 115,000 MW(e) of generating capacity could be utilized on the land which is available. The results further indicate that about half of this potential implementation is at stations that have enough land to accommodate waste heat utilization systems sized to use all of the reject heat of the station. Utilization of the remaining 50% is about equally distributed among sites capable of using between 10 and 90% of their reject heat. Further, it seems reasonable that for many applications, an integrated waste heat complex, using several waste heat technologies, will be required to avoid marketing problems. It also appears that single application systems will be important for the sites that can use only a small fraction of their total reject heat. A preliminary estimate of the potential for implementation at fossil stations was also performed. Based on these estimates it appears that implementation of waste heat utilization systems in the power industry will be limited by economic and marketing constraints rather than power plant land availability considerations. The sites were also examined to determine the relative importance of retrofit applications. Those stations having a starting date prior to 1981 for any unit were classed as retrofit applications. The results of this analysis indicated that about half the potential for waste heat utilization was in retrofit applications.