alt Hacker NewsNuclear plants, like most large thermal plants, are almost always located near large bodies of water and return that water downstream so it doesn't really matter?
Replies
moooo99 • yesterday at 7:59 PM
It does when you care about the environmental impact of your cooling (and also consider the fact that droughts are an increasingly severe problem).
pbmonster • yesterday at 8:10 PM
It matters when the level of that body of water drops by a lot in summer and the water temperature rises at the same time. Add environmental laws (cooking the fish is discouraged), and your nuke plant needs to go into safety shutdown pretty reliably every summer.
It matters if people don't want to see the rivers full of dead fish, so last year there were already shutdowns because of heatwaves.
https://www.euronews.com/2025/07/02/france-and-switzerland-s...