Cooling Water Structures for FitzPatrick Nuclear Plant

To comply with New York State temperature criteria, the condenser cooling water of the James A. FitzPatrick Nuclear Power Plant, located on Lake Ontario, will be discharged through a submerged diffuser. The discharge structure will be located in an average water depth of 30 ft and will consist of six pairs of nozzles, each 2.5 ft diam., connected by riser shafts to a tunnel excavated in bedrock under the lake bottom. The cooling water intake will be sector-shaped and located shoreward of the line of nozzles. The designs of intake and discharge structures are based on hydraulic model studies. Data for the model studies were obtained from surveys in the lake aimed at defining natural wind-induced currents and temperature distributions.