S&P - One Of The Biggest Risks To Future Power Generation - Lack Of Cooling Water As Earth Warms

[hatrack]

As global warming climbs and humanity’s water consumption increases, nuclear and fossil-fueled power plants that rely on freshwater for cooling may not be able to perform at their peak capacity or could be forced to shut down temporarily even as demand for their supplies for indoor cooling and other uses increase, according to researchers and industry experts.

Climate change-exacerbated water shortage issues pose a near-term and longer-term performance risk to power plants, such as hydropower and nuclear, around the world. And in the Lower 48, more than half of the fossil-fueled and nuclear fleet is located in areas forecast to face climate-related water stress by the end of this decade under a business-as-usual scenario, according to an analysis by S&P Global Market Intelligence.

But electric utilities’ overall exposure to power plant water stress risks could diminish as they pursue decarbonization strategies and replace water-dependent plants with wind and solar generation that require little to no water. Some companies are also implementing water management and related investment strategies to reduce their exposure. Water issues have become more and more important to utilities over time, said Alex Bond, Edison Electric Institute’s associate general counsel for energy and the environment. EEI is an association of U.S. investor-owned utilities.

Bond said water stress is one component of resilience that utilities currently monitor and analyze. “Our companies take electric sector resiliency very seriously,” he said. According to projections from the World Resources Institute’s Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas, water stress — when humanity’s competition for water exceeds the rate at which nature can replenish its stocks — could grow materially by 2030 in the drought-prone Western U.S., as well as the upper Midwest and portions of the Northeast and Florida, due to climate change.

About 61.8% of existing fossil-fueled and nuclear power plants in the Lower 48, or a combined 535 GW of operating capacity, is in areas that could face medium-high to extremely high water stress in 2030, based on an analysis of Market Intelligence’s power plant data paired with the Aqueduct water stress projections.

EDIT

https://climatecrocks.com/2020/10/22/climate-water-are-risks-for-nuclear-gas-coal/#more-62558

[Sherman A1]

1. We will see wars fought over water

this is going to be ugly if we don't do something quickly.