Good or Bad thing?

[rayke1938]

Reading free inner city local paper yesterday ( name may be Independent )at hospital and there was a small article about a so called environmental friendly air condition system for a new block of riverside units.

At the time I didn't pay much attention but basically it is proposed that they use a heat exchanger that is surrounded by river water to cool it and the warm river water is returned to the river 5 degrees warmer.

It will save them a lot of money as the air conditioning units will not need cooling towers and will reduce the amount of fresh water used.

Initially I thought beauty a hot water outlet in the river. It will be a good fishing spot but later I thought what if all riverside units do the same.?

Wouldn'T take too long for the temperature of the river to rise and what would happen then.

What do you think?

Cheers

Ray

[benno573]

i don't think it would make a huge difference. there is a lot of water movement in the river and the amounts of water we are talking are quite small. it might change by 0.5 degrees or something, just means more sharks over winter! it's good to see someone coming up with a practical solution to the traditional power hungry A/C units though!

coming from gladstone and knowing how much heated water get's pumped out of the power station (at 35 degrees mind you...) all the time, it hasn't had an adverse affect on the calliope at all.

[James W]

more threadys and barra!.....the hot water outlets?..besides the imediate area, does it affect the temp of the water ways they are in much?.. e.g gladstone?

[Leighton]

I would be looking for Sweedish tourists bathing in the Brisbane River Hot SpringsB)

[benno573]

Leighton wrote:

I would be looking for Sweedish tourists bathing in the Brisbane River Hot SpringsB)

you're an ideas man... :woohoo:

[Cowfish13]

Obviously, it's not as simple as more hot water = more summer species. It could affect growth of algae/aquatic plants and this will have an effect on higher order organisms.

With the one outlet, wouldn't make much difference, but if every one did it, well there's no way to completely tell. Will have to wait and see.

[flatty_catcher]

Bad thing

That is if in fact there is enough of them to actually change the water temperature.

River ecosystems can also have negative effects when runoff from city zones and such, where the runoff runs over warm roads and cement effectively warmer than it would be if it just ran over bush and earth.

But when all is said and done raising the rivers temperature is not good,thats if they actually do raise it significantly.

Dan

[Smiderman]

Anyone who's interested in giving the warm water a flick try under the freeway adjacent the Brisbane square building.

That building has all sort of eco friendly gimmicks of which one is the heat exchange ray discussed

[MoparKevUk]

As a past HVAC tech I was interested in this and found the EPA requirement that return water not be more than 2 ° C above the river water temperature at a location of 1m from the discharge point. So I don't reckon the impact will be that great.