Warm Water Haven: Manatees Depend on a Florida Power Plant's Outflow
In Florida, the Cape Canaveral Clean Energy Center's warm-water discharge shelters hundreds of manatees during cold snaps (a winter count recorded 585, with as many as 1,000 using the outfall), creating a crucial winter refuge that is sustained by industrial heat. While this saves the tropical mammals from cold stress, it risks turning into a dependency on a fragile, engineered refuge as natural springs decline and plant reliability becomes the refuge’s expiry date, prompting a push to restore natural warm-water habitats.