Cooling lagoons aim to reduce thermal discharges to marine ecosystems

Gulf countries that lack freshwater resources rely deeply on seawater desalination to meet their daily needs and cool down thermal generation plants. According to Gulf News, the United Arab Emirates alone uses four trillion litres of Gulf seawater each year to cool down its power plants, foundries and desalination plants. The byproduct of these operations produces a hot briny fluid that is then pumped back into the Gulf, seriously compromising coral reefs and the overall marine ecosystem. But Crystal Lagoons — the same people who were behind the worlds largest artificial lagoon planned for the Red Sea, is marketing a new closed-loop cooling system that would ensure that no more water would have to be extracted from the Gulf to cool down industrial plants! Thermal power plants require water for cooling, but disposing of that water back into the Gulf is not only harmful to the marine ecosystem, according to Crystal Lagoons, it is also a waste of thermal energy. Their cooling lagoons are set away from the sea, eliminating coastal degradation, and the water contained in them is consistently recycled. Joaquin Konow, development director at Crystal Lagoons, told Gulf News that onshore recyclable water pools "eliminate marine pollution from cooling-dependent industries, something critical for the Arabian Gulf that today is under pressure from industrialization, and has put in risk its extensive coral reefs, pearl oysters and marine ecosystems."