The original question was making a comparison between a gas-powered power station and a coal-powered power station, the former apparently not having cooling towers whereas the latter had.


Could it be that the gas-powered station is using some sort of combined-cycle system and it does have cooling towers but that they don't look like the conventional, waisted concrete structures that dominated coal-powered power station sites and BBC climate change reporting?


As a non-power engineer my thinking would be that a) gas-powered stations are typically of lower output than coal-powered, and b) combined-cycle gives higher efficiency so there isn't as much low-grade heat to dump anyway. These two factors would lead to a smaller and different design for extracting the waste heat.


The Musandam Independent Power Project in Oman,  for instance, is rated at (only) 120 MW - " The facility uses 15 Wärtsilä 34DF dual-fuel gas-powered engines with the ability to switch to light fuel oil. The engines are designed to operate in high-temperature environments; temperatures in the region often top 120F. The plant also uses minimal water for cooling, an important consideration in the arid region. "


(credit: Wärtsilä)

The original question was making a comparison between a gas-powered power station and a coal-powered power station, the former apparently not having cooling towers whereas the latter had.


Could it be that the gas-powered station is using some sort of combined-cycle system and it does have cooling towers but that they don't look like the conventional, waisted concrete structures that dominated coal-powered power station sites and BBC climate change reporting?


As a non-power engineer my thinking would be that a) gas-powered stations are typically of lower output than coal-powered, and b) combined-cycle gives higher efficiency so there isn't as much low-grade heat to dump anyway. These two factors would lead to a smaller and different design for extracting the waste heat.


The Musandam Independent Power Project in Oman,  for instance, is rated at (only) 120 MW - " The facility uses 15 Wärtsilä 34DF dual-fuel gas-powered engines with the ability to switch to light fuel oil. The engines are designed to operate in high-temperature environments; temperatures in the region often top 120F. The plant also uses minimal water for cooling, an important consideration in the arid region. "


(credit: Wärtsilä)