Looming Water Shortages Cut in Favor of Renewable Energy

    WSJ has an interesting article about the influence that dwindling water resources is having on the trend towards developing more renewable energy sources. Water is commonly overshadowed by greenhouse gas emissions in the discussion about dirty power versus renewable power. However, consumption of water by traditional power plants is a gigantic environmental issue. In fact, as the WSJ notes, “the electric-power industry accounts for nearly half of all water withdrawals in the U.S., with agricultural irrigation coming in a distant second at about 35%.”

    Although most of this water is eventually recycled back into nearby lakes or streams, 2-3% is lost by evaporation, and the heat from the water released back into the natural environment can be detrimental to surrounding life.

    As a result of these concerns, the power industry has been looking more closely at renewable plants, such as wind farms, as alternatives to traditional power sources. This is because most renewable energy plants use a tiny fraction of the amount of water extracted by dirty plants.

    According to one study, “a megawatt hour of electricity produced by a wind turbine can save 200 to 600 gallons of water compared with the amount required by a modern gas-fired power plant to make that same amount.”

    This fact, coupled with concerns over climate change, makes it even more obvious that the electricity generation industry must move away from dirty energy and towards renewables once and for all.

    日益迫近的淡水危機有利于促進可再生能源的開發

    《華爾街日報》（ The Wall Street Journal, 簡寫為WSJ）上有一篇有意義的文章，這篇文章談到目前正在減少的水資源對開發更多的可再生能源的趨勢所產生的影響。在論及有污染能源與可再生能源的時候，水的問題往往被溫室氣體排放所掩蓋掉。但是，傳統電力廠所消耗的水是一個巨大的環境問題。實際上正如《華爾街日報》所說，“在美國，電力工業消耗了幾乎近一半的水，農業灌溉用水排在第二位，但比電力消耗用水少很多，只占據了35%。”

    雖然大多數的水最后經過循環處理排回到附近的湖泊或者溪流中，但是仍然有2-3%的水蒸發掉了。另外，這些水（發電廠中用到的冷卻循環水，譯者注）中的熱量被釋放到自然環境中，這對周圍的生物是有害處的。

    考慮到這些問題，電力工業一直在關注把可再生能源發電廠作為傳統發電廠的替代，比如風力發電廠。這是因為大多數可再生能源發電廠的用水僅僅只占有污染發電廠用水的微小的一部分。

    據一項研究顯示，“與一個現代的天然氣火力發電廠相比，由風力渦輪機產生一兆瓦時的電力能節約200到600加侖的水。”

    很明顯，這個事實，再加上對氣候變暖的擔心，使發電行業必須從有污染的能源永遠轉向可再生的能源。

    Vocabulary:

Looming：日益迫近的
Renewable：可再生的
Dwindle：(逐漸)減少
Trend：趨勢
Overshadow：使黯然失色
Consumption：消耗
Traditional：傳統的
Gigantic：龐大的；巨大的
Withdrawal：取回；提取
Agricultural：農業的
Irrigation：灌溉
Eventually：最終的
Recycle：循環
Evaporation：蒸發
Detrimental：有害的
Alternative：可替換的
Tiny：微小的
Fraction：部分
Extract：抽取
Megawatt：兆瓦（一百萬瓦特）
Turbine：渦輪機
Gallon：加侖（液量單位，美制約等于3.8升）
Obvious：顯然的
Once and for all：永遠