70-04: Cooling Towers, The Environment and the Future

The market for cooling towers in the United States is experi­encing remarkable growth. For once, both the public and government 
sectors appear to be united and are combining on the hot issue of 
thermal pollution abatement and causing industry and especially the 
electrical utilities to cease dumping of thermal wastes into natural 
water courses. The largest single source of thermal wastes is the electrical utility industry, although there are contributions from all seg­ments of industry. This situation occurs as a direct result of the laws of thermodynamics and our dependence on steam as a fluid in electrical power generation.