Civil Engineering Photos

Photo Credit: Jessie Benaglio

This is one of 2 cooling towers for Fermi 2 Nuclear Power Plant on Lake Erie in Michigan. Fermi 2 is a 1,130-megawatt nuclear power plant owned and operated by Detroit Edison Company, an electric utility that serves 2.1 million customers in Southeastern Michigan. The plant’s cooling system is a “closed system” to prevent thermal or other pollution in Lake Erie. Each tower is 400-foot tall and has the capacity to cool 450,000 gallons of water per minute. The mist seen rising above the cooling towers is clean water vapor, about 8,000 gallons a minute per tower when the plant is in full operation. The black rows on the bottom of the tower show waterfalls of the cooled water that is being recirculated to cool off the steam from the turbines for the water to be used in the reactor.

Photo Credit: Jessie Benaglio

This is the control center of the Fermi 2 Nuclear Power Plant near Monroe, Michigan. The controls extend 360 degrees around the room and are meant to control every aspect of the nuclear operations. The octagon shape shows the fuel within the regulator. When lit it indicates a SCRAM, emergency shutdown of the reactor, is occurring. The analog display at the top shows the temperature of the water, the pressure, the water level, and the output Mega wattage produced from the plant.