Consequences of thermal pollution from a nuclear plant on lake temperature and mixing regime

We investigated the combined effects of thermal pollution from a nuclear power plant (NPP) and regional climate warming on the thermal regime of a lake. For this purpose, we used the lake model FLake and analyzed 50 years of temperature data from Lake Stechlin, Germany, which served as the cooling water reservoir for the Rheinsberg NPP from 1966 until 1990. Both modeling and statistical data analysis revealed a strong influence of the NPP cooling water discharge on the lake water temperatures and the vertical stability of the water column. A remarkable effect of thermal pollution consisted of strong vertical mixing in winter produced by the discharge of warm water into the lake when ambient water temperatures were below 4 °C. This effect caused a significant increase in the deep hypolimnion temperatures and a corresponding decrease of the vertical stability in the summer. In turn, climate warming had the opposite effect on the summer stability by increasing lake surface temperatures. Both the thermal pollution and climate change increased the duration of the summer stratification period. Our results suggest that industrial thermal pollution in temperate lakes during winter is stored in the deep water column until the next winter, whereas heat added in the summer dissipates relatively rapidly into the atmosphere. Accordingly, the winter thermal pollution could have a long-lasting effect on the lake ecology by affecting benthic biogeochemical processes.