The influence of the condenser cooling seawater salinity changes on the thermal performance of a nuclear power plant

This paper studies the impact of the salinity and temperature on the thermal performance of a proposed pressurized water reactor nuclear power plant. Applying the thermodynamic and heat transfer analyses based on the thermodynamic and heat transfer laws to gain some new aspects into the plant performance. The main results of this study are that many thermo-physical properties of seawater are affected by changes in salinity of the coolant extracted from environment. Also, the impact of increase in salinity leads to a decrease in the power output and the thermal efficiency of the nuclear power plant. This is abundantly important since one of the top goals of new power stations are to increase their thermal efficiency, and to prevent or minimize the reasons that lead to loss of output power. So, the paper offers an additional design dimension to be considered when designing new power stations.