Hatchery Technology Improvements

Dworshak Hatchery has a new chiller.  The chiller is used to cool water used to incubate Chinook salmon eggs in the incubation room (See December 9 posting).  This chiller replaces the original chiller which dates back to the 1980’s.  The old chiller was barely running and was only able to chill the water a few degrees.  Our new chiller is taking incoming water at 44 degrees and chilling it to 36 degrees.   Without the chiller, the incubating eggs would have hatched long ago and would need to be placed in rearing tanks soon.  Since there is no space for the small Chinook salmon right now, this would be a huge problem.  With the chiller operating, the juvenile Chinook will not need to be placed in rearing containers until April.  Last years’ Chinook salmon will have been stocked by then and the Chinook raceways will be empty and ready for another production cycle.

Dworshak's new water chiller, pre-installation

The new chiller is a significant technology advancement over the old chiller.  It is easier to program, utilizes less power to run and occupies a smaller footprint.  Eventually, the waste heat from the chiller will be tapped to heat one of the buildings.  This will save even more energy helping to meet the government's initiative to decrease power consumtion and be more green.