The authors are to be complimented for their excellent paper on a subject which is so vital for the planning and development of power plants in the decades ahead. The authors' proposed dry-and wetpeaking cooling tower systems offer an attractive option, both economically and technically, to the dry-towers-only system. In the past several years, we have seen an exponential growth rate of technical papers written on various aspects of dry cooling tower, systems for power plant applications.

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... gh it has been recognized that a dry cooling tower is, first, a proven technology, second, has considerably less site constraint and environment impact, and third, eliminates evaporative make-up water and blowdown disposal requirements, broad acceptance of dry tower systems for power plants in the U.S. has been very slow in coming. Why? The obvious reason is that a dry tower system may cost three to four times the capital cost compared to a wet tower system, plus the attendant penalty in plant efficiency by five to ten percent. Due to the high capital intensity of power system operation and the current constraint on capital, it becomes more difficult for the power industry to justify a dry towers power plant. Another reason is that make-up water for a wet towers system is still obtainable at a reasonable price which is foreseeable within this decade. 4 Consultant-Power Division, Stone and Webster Engineering Corp., ' Boston, Mass. Journal of Engineering for Power