[tyingq]

It evaporates in the chiller towers.

https://intra.ece.ucr.edu/~sren/project/water/img/water_cool...

[userbinator]

...and then comes down as rain somewhere else, eventually.

[auiya]

> somewhere else

Typically the ocean.

[LeifCarrotson]

So it is being reused for irrigation!

[adrianN]

If that somewhere else is too far away it won't help refill South Carolina's aquifers.

[tomatotomato37]

Charleston is over the Florida aquifer system, which is one of the largest aquifer systems in the world since the peninsula is essentially a huge sedimentary filter that's saturated by really aggressive storms on a seasonal basis