| Abstract |
Water, fuel, and energy issues are intricately related and cannot be addressed in isolation. With increasing population, increasing energy demand, continued migration towards and population growth within water stressed regions of the U.S., and with the continuing impacts of climate change on water availability, scarcity of freshwater will be an issue of paramount importance. Finding alternative water resources to replace freshwater demand for thermoelectric power generation and/or reducing water usage in cooling applications is inevitable and urgent. Biofuel production for transportation also has significant water requirements, especially at the cultivation stage. The assessment and adaptation studies described here investigate and integrate the current knowledge base of water usage in energy production industries. This report documents the research results on the generation of electricity and the emerging production of biofuels by assessing major trends in thermoelectric power generation and biofuels and investigating future water availability and water allocation for these energy production and energy transformation processes. Its primary focus is on coal-fired and natural gas-fired electric power plants, the production of corn-starch-based ethanol and cellulosic biofuels, the production of biodiesel, the impacts of all of these processes on water resources, as well as technologies available to adapt these processes to reduce their impact, particularly in water-stressed regions of the United States. The report includes detailed analyses and water resource adaptation strategies for sustainable energy production, including a case study focusing on the water-stressed southwestern U.S. using Las Vegas, Nevada as a specific example. |
