Coastal Tidal Effects on Industrial Thermal Plumes in Satellite Imagery

Abstract

Coastal tidal effects on thermal plumes are investigated, exploiting remote sensing of two major coastal industrial installations. The installations use sea water as a coolant, which is then released back into coastal environments at a higher-than-ambient temperature, allowing the plume to be delineated from the ambient waters. Satellite-based thermal sensors observing the Earth at spatial resolutions of 90 and 100 m are used. It is possible to identify coastal features and thermal spatial distributions. This paper presents coastal tidal effects on detected plumes for two case studies: an intertidal embayment and open water exposure, both on the coast of the UK. We correlated the behaviours of thermal plumes using remotely sensed high resolution thermal imagery with tidal phases derived from tide gauges. The results show very distinct behaviours for the flood and ebb tides. The detected surface plume location was dependent on flow switching direction for the different types of tide. The detected surface area was dependent on the strength of the currents, with the largest area observed during the strongest currents. Understanding the dispersion of the plume is essential to influence understanding of any potential ecological impacts.

Remote Sensing for Optimal Estimation of Water Temperature Dynamics in Shallow Tidal Environments

“…In this regard, it is interesting to observe that the remotely sensed water temperature in front of the industrial estate of Marghera is higher than the modeled water temperature. Since the performed simulation does not account for any local heat source caused by the industrial activities, these temperature differences can be attributed to the use of the water resource for cooling purposes by the production facilities, as noticed in other studies [60]. This observation highlights how a combined use of modeling results and spatial distributed temperature data can provide useful insights about the impact of the thermal pollution due to industrial activities and can evaluate the effects due to possible anthropic uses of the water resource (e.g., hydrothermic systems to be used for cooling/warming purposes of buildings in Venice in order to overcome the architectural impact of the common conditioners).…”

Frustrated-Laser-Induced Thermal Starting Plumes in Fresh and Salt Water

“…An additional motivation for this work is the importance of thermal plumes, both natural and human-made, in oceans and other bodies of water [6][7][8][9][10][11]. Understanding thermal plumes is crucial for comprehending various oceanic processes, including ocean circulation, heat transport, and their impact on climate systems [12].…”

The Effect of Unsteady Water Discharge through Dams of Hydroelectric Power Plants on Hydrodynamic Regimes of the Upper Pools of Waterworks

“…This approach is fully justified if the characteristic time of the change in water flow is much longer than the calculation time. However, nowadays, tasks are becoming more and more urgent when accounting for flow variability during calculations becomes crucial [27,28].…”