新鲜的晴天
是对核能发电厂过度的杀伤力的支持，或是一张明显经过PS图片：如何解释这些悍然带有夸张笑脸的冷却塔呢？这些图片更多地被反核的博客人用于嘲笑、近乎讥讽的时尚之中，也常常出现在有关核工业的左翼文章中。难道将笑脸放在核电站最明显的部分上真的错了吗？这和将经典的图片展示在水塔上有什么不同？何况都已不新鲜了。你又不是法官，干吗要去管这么多呢？好了，祝你有个好心情！
藏而不露
冷却塔早在核时代到来以前就出现了，这个事实也许让人感到吃惊。在第二次世界大战期间，英国政府试图将冷却塔（更重要的是，和它紧挨着的发电站）隐匿起来，躲过纳粹德国的空袭。受雇的画家尝试着将突兀的巨塔融入周围的风景之中。
这些最好的画家中有一人名叫Colin Moss（1914-2005），他是一名来自伊普斯维奇（Ipswich）早年毕业于伦敦的皇家艺术学院的美术老师。Moss的壁画能够留到今天，主要得益于他常常按照自己的想法作画，在冷却塔上作画形成的作品便是个很好的例子。
索威托的世界之“杯”
This dynamic duo was part of the infrastructure cleanup and buildup leading up to the 2010 FIFA World Cup which took place this summer in South Africa. While one cooling tower is painted in the colors and logo of the sponsor, FNB (First National Bank), the other is a vibrant celebration of folk art that displays the culture and traditions of Soweto.
这对冷却塔活力“组合”是南非基础设施清理和完善的一部分，它们于2010年世界杯开幕之前就已完工。其中一个冷却塔塔身被画上了赞助商第一国民银行（FNB）的色彩和标志，另一个则是体现索威托当地文化传统的、非常具有活力的民间艺术庆典。
The coal-fired Orlando Power Station was the most technologically advanced in Africa when it was built but the station is now closed. Nice to see the old cooling towers being put to good use – besides the beautification, tourists can pay to ride a power swing between the two towers and even jump inside one from the 300-ft top rim!
奥兰多（Orlando）煤电站建立之初曾是全非洲技术最先进的电厂，但现在它被关停了。很高兴看到废弃的冷却塔有了新用途，除了将它装饰之外，游客们可以付钱在两座塔之间荡秋千，甚至可以从300英尺高的塔顶边缘跳入其中。
Towers In Bloem
布隆方丹的冷却塔
Emboldened by the positive press sparked by the Orlando Cooling Towers’ extreme makeover, other South African cities jumped on the bandwagon. One of the most notable was the city of Bloemfontein, who commissioned ad agency Draftfcb Johannesburg to freshen up four 200-ft tall cooling towers.
受到奥兰多冷却塔大换装正面报道的鼓舞，其他南非城市大胆紧跟潮流。最著名的模仿中有一个来自布隆方丹，他们委任来自约翰内斯堡的Draftfcb广告公司来为4座200英尺高的冷却塔进行装扮。
As with the Soweto project, FNB is deeply involved: two towers are painted in the company’s 2010 FIFA World Cup logo & colors. The other pair of towers displays artwork by local crafts-people that celebrates the heritage of South Africa’s “City of Roses”.
和索威托项目一样，FNB积极参与其中：两座塔被画上了该公司的2010世界杯标志和色彩。另外一对塔则用来展示由当地工艺师设计的艺术作品，用来赞美其南非“玫瑰之城”的传统。
Coca-Cola Gets Cool
可口可乐变得很酷
Another Soweto cooling tower, a single one this time, was painted in the colors and corporate logo of Coca-Cola. Though the image may be interpreted by some to show the enormous gap between South Africa’s poor and the exceptional wealth of multinational corporations like Coca-Cola, the hut in the foreground is actually a temporary structure set up and used by vendors who provide services to workers building the local soccer stadium.
另一座索威托冷却塔，这回是单独一座，它被画上了可口可乐的色彩和公司商标。尽管一些人认为这幅图展示了南非的贫穷和像可口可乐这样的跨国公司庞大财富之间的巨大差距，但前景的小木屋事实上是个临时建造结构，是供应商用来给建造当地足球场的工人提供服务用的。
From a distance, on the other hand, the Coke Tower looms large in splendid solitude without even its former power plant still standing to give it some scale and context. Things go better with Coke? Not always, it seems.
另一方面，隔开一段距离，这座可口可乐塔在壮观的荒地中赫然耸立，甚至抽离了它先前发电站的给予它的规模和情境。难道都是得益于可口可乐？似乎并非都是如此。
Tinsley: Yorkshire Teardown
汀斯利：约克郡的拆毁
“The Stonehenge of the Carbon Age”… this grand epithet was bestowed upon the twin cooling towers at Blackburn Meadows, Tinsley, Sheffield by renowned British sculptor Antony Gormley. Such status didn’t prevent the towers from undergoing explosive demolition in August of 2008, unfortunately, despite a noisy campaign by local government, the community and stakeholders to preserve them in some way, shape or form.
“碳时代的巨石阵”，这宏伟的绰号被授予了位于谢菲尔德汀斯利布莱克本草地上的两座冷却塔，而这名字正是由英国著名的雕刻家安东尼·葛姆雷（Antony Gormley）起的。
A competition to replace, re-work or upcycle the towers was won by landscape architect firm Insite Environments, whose striking lattice steel homage shown above now has a better chance of seeing the light of day now that the towers have been demolished.
一项旨在替换、返修或是利用这些塔的竞赛由景观设计公司Insite Environments摘得桂冠。现在冷却塔已被拆除，上图显示的是它们设计的景观，十分吸引眼球的正交钢筋结构建筑迎来了问世的最佳时机。
Cruas Nuclear Power Station
克吕阿（Cruas）核电站
The Cruas Nuclear Power Station on the Rhone river was competed in 1985 and today provides France with nearly 5% of its electric energy annually. Four massive cooling towers serve the quartet of onsite nuclear reactors whose cores are kept comfortably chill by river water drawn from the fast-flowing Rhone.
隆河上的克吕阿核电站建成于1985年，现在每年支撑着全法国近5%的电力供应。四个巨大的冷却塔为正在工作的核反应堆服务，后者的核心温度由流速较快的隆河倾斜下的河水帮助得以保持适度的低温。
In 1991 the owners of the power plant decided to improve the public perception of the Cruas station by ordering an ecologically-themed mural for one of the cooling towers. The commission went to Jean-Marie Pierret, whose previous work includes the enormous painting of Hercules on the face of the Tignes dam. Pierret enlisted 9 mountaineers who expended 8,000 working hours and 4,000 liters of paint before the mural – titled “Aquarius” – was finished in 2005.
1991年，发电厂的所有者通过为其中一座冷却塔订购生态主题的壁画来增加克吕阿核电站的公共认知程度。核电站执委会找到了Jean-Marie Pierret，他先前的作品包括有蒂涅水坝表面巨大的大力神像。Pierret征召了9名登山家，他们花费了8千个工作时和4千升颜料，直到2005年才完成，并被起名为“宝瓶座”。
Light Monuments of Switzerland
瑞士的光纪念碑
The Swiss may not have a navy but they’ve got nuclear power plants – including this one: Kernkraftwerk Gösgen. The plant was one of a number of industrial, architectural and otherwise notable subjects in a wide-ranging Light Art exhibition conceived and organized by Gerry Hofstetter.
瑞士人也许没有海军，但他们却有核电站，包括Kernkraftwerk Gösgen核电站这座。Gerry Hofstetter构想并负责组织了主题广泛的光艺术展览。发电站只是他包括工业的、农业的等等鲜明标志中的一个。
The advantage of Hofstetter’s methodology lies in its transience: transformed by night, the towers revert to their normal appearance by the next morning. Additionally, Hofstetter can change the tone, topic and type of design at his leisure, without needing to physically alter the surface of the towers or for that matter, the attached power plant and even the steam rising into the night sky.
Hofstetter方法论的优点在于变化无常：冷却塔晚上变换模样，到了第二天一早又恢复原貌。不仅如此，他空闲时还改变节奏、主题和设计的样式，而且不需要物理上改变塔身表面，看起来被装扮的发电厂甚至和升腾的蒸汽一同奔向夜空。
Six Flags Over Three Mile Island?
三里岛上的六面旗主题公园
The widely reported and oft-satirized partial meltdown at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania caused many to re-evaluate their image of nuclear power. Indeed, the March 1979 accident – plus fallout from the release of the film The China Syndrome 12 days BEFORE the accident at TMI – helped drive the nuclear industry’s PR to its knees. The good old days of “Our Friend the Atom” were gone for good.
发生过被广泛报道和再三讽刺灾难的三里岛坐落在宾夕法尼亚州首府哈里斯堡不远的地方，它也常引得许多人们对核电站的图像进行了重新评估。事实上，1979年三月发生事故时，正值电影《中国综合症》上映后的第12天，电影剧情中增加的放射性尘埃帮助驱使了现实中核电站的公关对此屈服。过去“原子是我们的朋友”美好时光也一去不复返了。
Protests and demands that Three Mile Island be shut down were met with varying responses, including Art Riley’s fanciful re-imagining of the plant as a Disney-style theme park. We’re not sure whose image suffers worse, power plants or clowns.
抗议和要求三里岛核电站关闭的呼声遭遇了不断的响应，包括Art Riley想象的将发电站重新构想成迪斯尼风格的主题公园。我们不确定以上哪副图像让人感觉更糟，是发电厂，还是小丑们？
Post-Nuclear Wunderland
核电站之后的景观世界
Before Three Mile Island, however, nuclear power was seen by both governments and energy consumers as the way of the future. New types of reactors were designed, including the Fast Breeder reactor powered by plutonium and cooled by liquid sodium. One such fast breeder reactor (the SNR-300) was planned for Kalkar, a town in Germany close to the Belgian and Dutch borders.
然而，在三里岛之前，核电站被政府和能源消费者看做是将来的一种方式。新型的反应堆被设计出来，包括由钚提供能量，液态钠参与冷却的快中子增殖反应堆。这样的反应堆（SNR-300）打算建造在比利时和荷兰边境上的德国城镇Kalkar里。
Construction began in 1972 but as it progressed, concerns about the safety of the reactor and descriptions of the horrific consequences of an accident stoked a fierce backlash that forced authorities to cancel the project. What to do? The Kalkar complex sprawled over an area the size of 80 soccer fields and had enough wiring to circle the globe… twice.
建造开始于1972年，但在进行过程中，考虑到反应堆的安全，以及对可怕的事故后果进行的描述又起到添油加醋的作用，当局只好被迫取消了此项计划。他们要做什么？Kalkar核电站遭遇的复杂情况源于其有80个足球场那么大，装电线多到可以环绕地球一圈，甚至两圈。
A Dutch investor bought the site along with the infrastructure in 1991 and proceeded to turn it into Wunderland Kalkar. The outside of the cooling tower was painted with a cheery mountain mural while inside, a swing ride keeps park visitors happily screaming. Better that than the other kind of screaming, amiright?
1991年，一名荷兰投资者买下了基础设施在内的这片土地，打算将它建成Kalkar景观世界。冷却塔的外部画上了雪山壁画，同时在里面，过山车让公园的旅客们因兴奋而尖叫。这难道不比因其他原因而尖叫好得多吗？
Some might wonder if it’s appropriate to co-opt the arts in making large-scale power generation look more attractive. A few might even state that culture – pop or otherwise – has no business interacting with corporations who, when it comes to the environment, are part of the problem and not the solution. To those I say that it’s too late: coal and nuclear power have become part of our lives and those iconic cooling towers are as commonplace as donuts in a donut shop… mmm, donuts.
有些人也许怀疑用大规模的艺术品来让发电厂看起来更受欢迎是否合适。一些人甚至指出若流行或是另外的文化和公司没有什么商业联系，当涉及到环境问题时，公司们就成了问题的一部分，而不是解决方法。对它们而言，我说这些太迟了：煤电厂和核电站已经变为我们生活的一部分，那些配有图画的冷却塔有如油炸圈饼店里的甜甜圈一般常见...嗯，没错，是甜甜圈！
