
But that trend will have to accelerate in order to keep people cool and slaked in a warmer world. In the US, the overall water use per unit of energy has been declining in recent years. The good news is that the energy sector is learning to do more with less water. Low water levels in the Rhine River are threatening to disrupt coal and gasoline shipments in Germany.Īs average temperatures continue to rise, many parts of the world will see energy demands grow and supplies constrained, with water as the key factor on both sides of the equation. French nuclear plants have also received allowances to discharge hotter water back into rivers to meet energy demand. France has had to curb output from its nuclear power plants because the water they use for cooling warmed up too much. Extreme weather around the world, worsened by climate change, is causing all sorts of stresses to power grids. With hydropower production falling in recent months, natural gas plants are filling the void in the United States, leading to even more greenhouse gas emissions that heat up the planet. “Water supplies for agriculture, fisheries, ecosystems, industry, cities, and energy are no longer stable given anthropogenic climate change,” Camille Calimlim Touton, commissioner of the Bureau of Reclamation, told Congress in June. National Integrated Drought Information System Power plants across huge swaths of the Western United States are under drought conditions. Lake Mead fuels the Hoover Dam, which has a power capacity topping 2,000 megawatts while Lake Powell drives generators that peak at 1,300 megawatts at the Glen Canyon Dam. The United Nations Environment Programme warned this month that if drought conditions persist, the two largest hydroelectric reservoirs in the US - Lake Mead and Lake Powell -could eventually reach “ dead pool status,” where water levels fall too low to flow downstream. As the climate changes, these stresses will mount. At the same time, exceptional heat has pushed energy demand to record highs. The consequences of water shortages are playing out now in swaths of the American West, where an expansive, decades-long drought is forcing drastic cuts in hydroelectric power generation. So when temperatures rise and water levels drop, the energy sector gets squeezed hard. In turn, it requires energy to extract, purify, transport, and deliver water. The large majority of that share is used to cool power plants. About 40 percent of water withdrawals - water taken out of groundwater or surface sources - in the United States go toward energy production.
#NUCLEAR THRONE WATER LEVEL SERIES#
Other critics had similar qualms with the series not living up to the original Game of Thrones when it comes to characters, plot and overall quality.īrian Lowry of CNN saw the prequel as a “less-addictive game for an earlier throne” but said it was “not bad.” “There are dragons aplenty, but it doesn’t produce the sort of character that defined and elevated its predecessor to prestige-TV royalty,” he wrote.From spinning turbines to hydraulic fracturing to refining fuel, the flow of water is critical to the flow of electrons and heat. “It’s best to brace now for the genealogy chatter around Houses Targaryen, Lannister, Velaryon and Hightower, for theories connecting the future with the past and for ghoulish discussions of which series featured more graphic displays of blood, gore and guts.”īy contrast, Darren Franich of Entertainment Weekly described the opening scene as “the blandest possible orientation, Epic Fantasy for Dummies” and said the good news is that “the beginning is the worst part.” “This fresh chapter in the saga of the Seven Kingdoms is reverse-engineered to feed into narratives and family trees that are familiar to ‘GoT’ devotees,” he said.


Lorraine Ali of the Los Angeles Times said the spin-off “recaptures the power, grandeur of the original.” In the show, a civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons ensues between Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen and her brother Aegon II Targaryen over who takes the throne after the passing of their father, Viserys l.
