US Report Finds Sky Is the Limit For Geothermal Energy Beneath Us (arstechnica.com) 154
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Geothermal power sources come in many forms, and they're typically much more subtle than steam shooting out of the ground. In reality, geothermal energy could be a big player in our future mix. That is made clear by the U.S. Department of Energy's recently released "GeoVision" report. The report follows similar evaluations of wind, solar, and hydropower energy and leans on information from national labs and other science agencies. It summarizes what we know about the physical resources in the U.S. and also examines the factors that have been limiting geothermal's deployment. Overall, the report shows that we could do a whole lot more with geothermal energy -- both for generating electricity and for heating and cooling -- than we currently do.
There are opportunities to more than double the amount of electricity generated at conventional types of hydrothermal sites, where wells can easily tap into hot water underground. That's economical on the current grid. But the biggest growth potential, according to the report, is in so-called "enhanced geothermal systems." These involve areas where the temperatures are hot but the bedrock lacks enough fractures and pathways for hot water to circulate freely -- or simply lacks the water entirely. Advancing enhanced geothermal techniques alone could produce 45 gigawatts of electricity by 2050. Add in the more conventional plants, and you're at 60 gigawatts -- 26 times more than current geothermal generation. And in a scenario where natural gas prices go up, making geothermal even more competitive, we could double that to 120 gigawatts. That would be fully 16 percent of the total projected 2050 generation in the U.S. The report also estimates that installations of traditional ground-source heat pumps, which circulate fluid through loops in the ground to provide cooling in the summer and heating in the winter, could be increased 14 times over, to 28 million homes by 2050, "covering 23 percent of national residential demand." When factoring in the limitations for how quickly the market could realistically change, the number only goes down to 19 million homes -- still a massive increase.
Meanwhile, district heating systems, where a single, large geothermal installation pipes heat to all the buildings in an area, could be more widely deployed to more than 17,000 locations, covering heating needs for 45 million homes.
There are opportunities to more than double the amount of electricity generated at conventional types of hydrothermal sites, where wells can easily tap into hot water underground. That's economical on the current grid. But the biggest growth potential, according to the report, is in so-called "enhanced geothermal systems." These involve areas where the temperatures are hot but the bedrock lacks enough fractures and pathways for hot water to circulate freely -- or simply lacks the water entirely. Advancing enhanced geothermal techniques alone could produce 45 gigawatts of electricity by 2050. Add in the more conventional plants, and you're at 60 gigawatts -- 26 times more than current geothermal generation. And in a scenario where natural gas prices go up, making geothermal even more competitive, we could double that to 120 gigawatts. That would be fully 16 percent of the total projected 2050 generation in the U.S. The report also estimates that installations of traditional ground-source heat pumps, which circulate fluid through loops in the ground to provide cooling in the summer and heating in the winter, could be increased 14 times over, to 28 million homes by 2050, "covering 23 percent of national residential demand." When factoring in the limitations for how quickly the market could realistically change, the number only goes down to 19 million homes -- still a massive increase.
Meanwhile, district heating systems, where a single, large geothermal installation pipes heat to all the buildings in an area, could be more widely deployed to more than 17,000 locations, covering heating needs for 45 million homes.
Not enough bribes for the politicians (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Not enough bribes for the politicians (Score:5, Funny)
That's true for ANY infrastructure. Glenn Reynolds often decries this or that development concept as having "insufficient opportunities for graft".
As contrasted to California's "High Speed Rail" project, which is COMPLETELY driven by graft.
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"As contrasted to California's "High Speed Rail" project, which is COMPLETELY driven by graft."
Surely greed, sloppy thinking, etc,etc,etc also play a roll. I can understand, and completely empathize with the desire to get out of Modesto as quickly as possible. But I think I'd probably like to go someplace other than Bakersfield or Fresno. And I'm not sure why Greyhound speeds aren't more than adequate.
Seems to me that any realistic HSR project in California should connect the downtowns (such as they are)
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California is effectively a one party state. The problem with the HSR project, besides the graft, has been that the people pushing it claimed it would cost much, much less than it really would cost (most likely figuring that once you sunk a shit-ton of money in, politicians would keep throwing money at it until it was done).
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> It's corruption that means CAHSR hasn't been built.
The bids were never realistic. This wasn't broken by graft, it was a non-starter (note the cost of the Seattle SR 99 Tunnel). The costs for many of the segments were easily calculable, but were not accurate. Claiming that graft broke it after the multiple voter approvals of free construction money, is revisionist.
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Back in the 1980's I read a New Scientist article where the USGS had a report that if around 1% of the geothermal energy 1km below the USA was turned into electricity it would be enough power for over 100 years. That was over 30 years ago and drilling technology is way way better today.
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Back in the 1980's I read a New Scientist article where the USGS had a report that if around 1% of the geothermal energy 1km below the USA was turned into electricity it would be enough power for over 100 years. That was over 30 years ago and drilling technology is way way better today.
If I recall correctly, one of the big issues is that the pipes carrying steam or water get gunked up pretty quickly. A lot of dissolved minerals in the water, especially when used this way.
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That's why Geothermal plants should be closed loop systems... but that moderately increases the up-front cost, so there's less money left over for graft.
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For oil wells, the drill is a pipe that mud is pumped down and out the end to provide for lubrication. If drilling for thermal, all they'd have to do is provide for two additional passages: one for pumping water down, and the other for returning steam. The closed loop should actually be technically simple.
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When you're drilling, yes. But in most cases you then "complete" the well, lining it with pipe all the way down, and install one or several strings of production tubing into the well, latching into settings on the inside of the liner pipe. In most cases you'd have a production tubing (oil or gas to surface) and a string for "killing" the well by pumping high-density fluid into the wellbore. So conventional
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to make this a viable option. Decisions aren't made on the basis what's best for the environment but on what's in it for the politicians on both left and right. Coal, fossil fuel and nuclear energy is backed by big coorperations who can supply the needed campaign funds to the politicians, so we'll be stuck with those for a while.
The drilling offers opportunities for a politician to get his baksheesh. The buildings and any turbines as well.
Geothermal leaves a lot of minerals on parts and inside piping, so there will have to be a replacement stream.
There is plenty of corruptortunity here.
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Coal is so bad that they can no longer afford the bribes necessary to keep this expensive, horrible pollution heavy energy source
Nuclear is so scary that they can no longer afford the bribes necessary to keep this cheap, safe energy source around
Oil is profitable enough to bribe the officials to ignore their moderately polluting industry going.
Natural gas is easily profitable enough to keep their cheap and low-pollution industry going, they really don't need to bribe anyone.
Solar and wind are profitable e
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"District heating" would work - or COULLD work - around cities that have lots of apartment buildings that currently use boilers to heat water for radiator systems, But mostly geothermal isn't available around cities.
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District heating DOES work in the places that use it. Con Edison's steam system in NYC is a pretty good example of this. There are many buildings that are both heated AND cooled(adsorption cooling) using the steam system. But yes, it goes without saying that distance from the heat source is important. After a certain point, converting that steam into electricity makes more sense from an energy transport viewpoint.
Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:5, Informative)
Geothermal energy is a really good idea, complicated by the fact that it doesn't work well in the actual Earth. The pipes are subject to terrific corrosion, and the maintenance costs are unsustainable..
Seems to work well in Iceland... (Score:5, Informative)
Geothermal energy is a really good idea, complicated by the fact that it doesn't work well in the actual Earth. The pipes are subject to terrific corrosion, and the maintenance costs are unsustainable..
It seems like it works out pretty well in Iceland, although there they have much easier access to multiple geothermal sources... I could see a lot of places where access to that is more impractical and would cost way too much.
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In Iceland you don't have to drill very far to reach usable geothermal sources, so needing to drill new boreholes every few years as the old ones plug up is not a problem. This article draws a map of what American geothermal provinces would look like if we were willing to go down 7 km each time. Even that shows plentiful geothermal only in the West. And every new borehole is another 7 km.
Iceland is awesome (Score:3)
But the downside is living in Iceland.
I know you are just trolling but seriously, you should check out Iceland. It is amazing and beautiful and a great place to be. Maybe a bit heavy on the tourists now but if you go a ways outside ReykjavÃk that probably goes down.
I think living there would be amazing, may retire there in a hundred years or so. People think of it as cold but it's not nearly as cold and way more green than, say, Greenland (heavy irony).
Re:Iceland is awesome (Score:5, Interesting)
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He routinely posts misleading and false far right bullshit. I'm content with the occasional argument peppered with insults, but it's easy to see how he attracted the incoherent raving lunatics. Yeah yeah, -1 off topic flamebait troll, bite me delusional far right wingers.
And? I have no issues with SuperKendell even if I disagree with him at times. (disagreement is not an issue) Posts with a nym, Isn't a total ass even if some think so. Some think I am too.
I get AC troll reply notifications via mail, but for reading on site, that slidey bar is your best friend. Makes the troglodytes disappear.
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I've noticed recently that you and a few other regular posters always get replies by nasty trolls. Nobody sees them because they're always at -1, but are the trolls trying to wear down the regular posters who make up most of the quality debate on ./ since ./ still is the only place on the net with an efficient moderation system ?
Hehe, we are protected by that little slldey bar near the top of the page. Wipes those little parasites right out.
As well, there can be a certain amount of satisfaction in pissing off some dopey troll AC. If you feel compelled to reply, of course.
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That slider also ensures an echo-chamber among a handful of accounts that somehow get the majority of moderation regardless of quality.
Nevermind most of those "troglodytes" are actually account holders saying what they really feel after applying their modpoints. Like me, for example- well, except for the troglodyte virtiol of course.
Sorry, if it's so damn important that you post giving your incredibly important and insigthful opinion after seeing what some asshole poster wrote, you just lose the mod points.
And it ain't an echo chamber either, sparky. Unless you consider blocking the posts by people with psychsexual problems or the sissy posting his Nazi Swastika shit is somehow valuable alternative truths that we snobs need to see.
Yeah, my dear coward - and I mean that in every possible sense of the word, post with a name, and I'll
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The troll replies are kinda flattering. We are apparently infamous enough to get personalized trolling, even our own memes.
It's the troll moderation that is the problem, because that does actually censor people and stifle debate.
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:5, Interesting)
Geothermal works fine. I live in hawaii. The puna geothermal plant generated 35 MW day in and day out for decades. Last years eruption shut it down, but it should be back up by end of year. The company has been able to turn a profit for decades.
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:5, Interesting)
Geothermal works fine. I live in hawaii. The puna geothermal plant generated 35 MW day in and day out for decades.
That is nice, but is only about 1% the output of a large nuke or gas plant.
Also, electricity on the Big Island is 42 cents/kwh. Operating profitably at that price doesn't mean much. On the mainland, electricity can be generated from gas for 3 cents/kwh.
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:4, Interesting)
Geothermal is fine where geothermal exists naturally but not where it does not exist. So cold water goes down, gets hot and dissolves what ever molecules it can and brings them to the surface, heavy metals and toxic chemicals, as they come up, well they leak all over and contaminate ground water. Not a problem in natural locales, as they are already naturally polluted and not healthy for life already but in clean environments, quite problematic.
Geo thermal could be mass used in dangerous locales to cool them and generate energy which is then conducted to distant locales. Geothermal should not be used where is there is currently no water going down and coming up, full of dissolved chemicals, past the deep ground water and past the water table.
Geothermal should only be used where the soil and ground water are already contaminated.
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That's actually not really true of modern systems at all, they have the layers sealed and they monitor for contaminants. You're referring to a few places where the installations are either early trials or failing systems with failing topography.
It certainly contaminates a hell of a lot less than fracking, which you're getting natural gas from EVERYWHERE along the US water table except where specifically banned BY DEMOCRATS to protect water resources.
If you want to pretend to be against Geothermal because o
Geothermal Power is A CLOSED LOOP SYSTEM (Score:4, Interesting)
Geothermal should not be used where is there is currently no water going down and coming up, full of dissolved chemicals, past the deep ground water and past the water table.
Geothermal should only be used where the soil and ground water are already contaminated.
Assessments of closed loop geothermal systems [osti.gov] have been performed. Studies have been done on the efficiency [sciencedirect.com] and optimization [sciencedirect.com] of closed loop Geothermal systems.
Geothermal is a perfect base load and peak following grid input because the heat is always in the ground and available. It's the perfect complement to wind and solar.
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Your attempt to confused ideologues with facts will fail because the committed ideologue will never read your facts.
Whilst I agree with you it's more about what we're not talking about that is important.
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Yep. At Calpine Geothermal in The Geysers, CA they created a super fund site by putting the slurry of metals and radioactives pressure-washed off of the turbines into drums and burying them in a field just off of Butts Canyon road, out of Middletown. The site is easily identified by a cyclone fence with big fat governmental no trespassing signs, apparently surrounding a whole lot of nothing. And because it's a government project, they planted a bunch of invasive and fragile eucalyptus trees along the road b
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By "closed loop" it means that the water is injected back into the field. It doesn't mean a sealed heat transfer tube end-to-end. So while the working fluid does not emit into the environment, it is in contact with the subterranean elements and can carry solutes into the pipes and gunk them up. Even in a binary plant you still have some water circulating in contact with rock. The reason this is done is due to the need for a lot of surface area to exchange the amount of heat that must be exchanged for th
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Industrial scale is different. You need to get a huge rate of heat to generate electricity and to do that you need a huge surface area, and at that depth they cannot just bury a horizontal network of pipes like they do under a lawn.
Most home systems are not generating electricity, just moving heat around.
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:5, Interesting)
The fact that a large nuclear or gas plant is larger than this geothermal plant is an irrelevant change of subject.
If you wish to start an argument over the relative costs of power generation by different means, then you'll need to first address the fact that the US Energy Information Administration rates geothermal as the single cheapest source of power. By a good margin. Below wind and natural gas, and way below nuclear.
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You're replying to someone talking about a geothermal power generation plant with an opinion about geothermal ground source heat pumps (a.k.a. a geoexchange system). They are two different things. In the former case, outside temperature is a minor factor (and it is better the colder it is out) because you're working with a heat source at several hundred degrees fahrenheit.
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Great! All we have to do is transform the rest of the places where people live into places where lava periodically bubbles up over the surface, vs drilling down half a mile to where the rocks start getting hot enough to be useful. No differences there. . . AT ALL.
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:5, Interesting)
I know that current geothermal installations mostly pump water into porous bedrock through one well, and the have differently located well that captures whatever water and steam get pushed through that porous rock. Seems like a waste of water and inefficient.
Not knowing anything about the topic (aka typical Slashdotter) I wonder why they don't run a continuous loop system similar to how residential geothermal heat pumps are designed. One well that goes down to the hot rock below, and then travels back up to the plant to drive the turbines,and back down again in a loop. I assume there's a lot of trickiness in drilling through hot rock at depth. But for a large initial investment, seems like the payoff over time would be worth it. And greatly reduced fault activity.
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They do what you describe to some degree but each site is geologically specific to what makes sense. Not to mention as you say the deep bore plumbing/monitoring is much more expensive than a simple system.
https://geothermalcommunities.eu/assets/elearning/7.18.geothermal.pdf
https://www.buildings.com/news/industry-news/articleid/21486/title/meet-the-district-energy-loop-a-larger-scale-geothermal-heat-pump
http://www.thinkgeoenergy.com/city-of-vienna-sees-start-of-large-scale-geothermal-research-project/
https:
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The issue is that the heat energy is fairly low density, so you need a large heat sink to capture it. Just having a U shaped pipe or small tank down there wouldn't capture enough energy to produce useful amounts of electricity.
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:4, Interesting)
The issue is that the heat energy is fairly low density, so you need a large heat sink to capture it. Just having a U shaped pipe or small tank down there wouldn't capture enough energy to produce useful amounts of electricity.
Supercritical CO2 [semanticscholar.org]instead of water as a working fluid looks like a potential way to address that issue.
The paper shows the location and temperature map of geothermal USA. A country so blessed with wind, sun and also geothermal power it's a real shame it isn't available to more people.
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Seismicity. That's not the whole answer, but it's the only part you need to worry about.
The turbines for the facility at the Geysers are about 6-8 feet across, and about ten feet long. I saw one being delivered by halliburton trucking.
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"Geothermal energy is a really good idea, complicated by the fact that it doesn't work well in the actual Earth."
Perhaps a bit harsh. It's more like a really good idea that needs a **LOT** of R&D before it should be widely deployed. Not only does one have to worry about the lifetime of the underground pipes, but also about what exactly happens when they fail in 20 or 200 or 2000 years. e.g. Will they turn out to be conduits to the surface for stuff we'd just as soon stayed deep underground like Mercu
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Yeah that is why iceland has given it up (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah totally uneconomical. Nobody use it . Nope. Noper.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Ho, wait. No. They do ! they generate 95% of their home heating and 25% of their electricity with geothermal power. I have the nagging feeling you over exaggerate the corrosive issue.
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Geothermal heating using shallow heat pipes is highly viable, although frankly I'd rather not live in a volcano field. And that's where geothermal of any sort is viable. In the USA, geothermal is simply not cost-effective. Even the calpine geothermal visitors' center had to install solar panels on the roof to ensure continual clean power. And it's located in the most geothermally active region of the crust...
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Is that because the oil used in heating systems is so cheap in the US?
That's probably part of it, but our geothermal plant is perpetually over budget, and under projected production.
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You only find plentiful geothermal taps in volcano fields. Frankly, I don't want to live in one of those, but if you're happy in them, that's fine. One good quake and it's volcano city...
Re:Geothermal Power is HIGHLY corrosive (Score:4, Informative)
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The pipes are subject to terrific corrosion, and the maintenance costs are unsustainable.
Just use PVC pipes, that don't corrode -- duh. Oh, wait...
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That's nice and all (Score:2)
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but who's gonna pay for it?
You would, just like you pay for any other energy you buy. I bet you already knew that answer.
Re:That's nice and all (Score:4, Insightful)
The same way anything is paid for in a free market. Capital is pooled, costs are amortized over time, investors get ROI, and if an installation is built well enough after that you're looking at maintenance costs and eventual replacement. It's a way of building things that has worked pretty damned well since the 18th century.
Re:"free market" (Score:2)
Capital is pooled
Made up, you mean. There's bound to be a bank involved, which just makes up money that never existed, and "lends" it out. The usury for the loan is quite real though, and is forced upon society to pay "back".
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The same way anything is paid for in a free market. Some rich asshats convince some banks to secure them a loan based on a pie in the sky idea and pretend they are an actual company. Shares are sold to "investors" who then flip those shares right away to suckers who think this is an actual company. The asshats clear out, dropping responsibility on the CEO and the Board along with a fuck ton of debt from starting the "company" (all paid to other companies owned by the asshats).
See? It's so simple. All you ne
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The taxpayer and the customer will pay for it, whether or not they are the same person. And they would get more for their money with solar or wind.
And the earthquakes? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm all about green energy but I have yet to read anything about eliminating the earthquakes that geothermal energy causes. Geothermal is basically injecting water into a hot chunk of the Earth's crust. The predictable result is the water is heated and the Earth is cooled. All the thermal expansion and contraction causes earthquakes and despite our investigations into reducing earthquakes, [sciencedaily.com] they will keep happening without significant advancements in our ability to drill deep into the Earth's crust.
The sky is the limit... for the damage that geothermal plants can do, just ask South Korea. [wikipedia.org]
Re:And the earthquakes? (Score:4, Informative)
It depends where you do it. If you avoid doing it near major faults then the earthquakes are small. Do it far from populated areas and people won't even notice.
It's not ideal but all energy generation has some impact on the surrounding area. Geothermal isn't suitable for everywhere, but is fine in some places.
The earthquake in Korea is unlikely to have been anything to do with the geothermal plant, BTW. Even the Wikipedia article you linked to says that.
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All wrong. No major faults run through The Geysers, CA, where the USA has its geothermal facility. Yet pumping secondary treated sewage into the ground has dramatically increased local seismicity to the point that a fund was created and many millions of dollars have been paid out.
Solar has no notable effect on the surrounding area. Wind either. (There is a minor localized downwind heating effect, which rapidly dissipates.) Geothermal is dumb except for shallow heat pipes, but living where those work is dumb
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Interesting. Wikipedia doesn't seem to think it's a big deal. I'll have to do more research.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
I prefer wind anyway. There are some effects, birds killed, flicker, very slight local warming, but nothing major. Stick them off-shore and they are even less of an issue.
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Interesting. Wikipedia doesn't seem to think it's a big deal. I'll have to do more research.
Here is a local article to get you started [pressdemocrat.com].
Re:And the earthquakes? (Score:4, Interesting)
"I'm all about green energy but I have yet to read anything about eliminating the earthquakes that geothermal energy causes."
Not really an issue most places with reasonable care. The problems in Oklahoma weren't caused by the fracked gas wells per se. They were caused by subsequent disposing of used fracking fluids into a sandstone layer -- The Arbuckle Formation -- below all of the hydrocarbon producing beds in the region without worrying about how the Arbuckle was able to suck up all that fluid and where it was going. Apparently it was going into earthquake faults. There's a substantial difference between using underground pipes for heat exchange and using them for fluid disposal.
It probably is true that geothermal wells may be imprudent in some earthquake prone areas like coastal California if for no other reason than if any one of the thousands of faults in the area slips (which happens all the time) and does surface damage (less frequent, but not uncommon), you're probably going to get sued. It is California after all.
Heat pump (Score:2)
I know what we'll call it! (Score:4, Funny)
simple way to increase ground source HVAC (Score:3)
With that single requirement, we get AE high prices, esp. solar, to work to solve multiple issues. Basically, the high price of solar will encourage builders to switch to better forms of insulation (such as aerogel windows) and of course, better forms of HVAC, such as geo-thermal.
Also, the real heat loss come from rentals that do not bother to upgrade insulation, HVAC, etc. About the only way to improve these other than by a whole lot of regulations, is to require that landlords start paying part of the HVAC costs. By requiring an increasing cost of the HVAC to go to the landlord, they will include it in the rent, until the point it is actually cheaper for the landlord to put on more insulation or AE. Otherwise, they will lose customers to newer cheaper low-hvac cost buildings, or updated ones.
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to require that landlords start paying part of the HVAC costs
Or, more simply and freely, require them to quote the HVAC/electric bill for past years along with the rent, so potential tenants know what they are getting into.
I hate district heating (Score:5, Interesting)
I know that in some places, it is the right solution.
My problem is that I have seen how when it have been privatised, those in charge use the fact that their customers are forced to buy from them to increase the price to fund investments in expanding their business into other areas that the heating customers have no interest in or benefit of.
Re: I hate district heating (Score:1)
That is still better than being nationalized and allowing the infrastructure to crumble without upgrades all while raising the price because there is no competition.
Unintended Consequences (Score:1)
Does anyone know if there are any potential unintended consequences for this? Suppose we start sucking power from the earth at a pace in the TW or PW range? Would this affect the earth in 5, 10, or 100 years? When humans started burning coal and oil over a century ago, I doubt anyone anticipated global warming.
I never formally studied physics beyond the introductory level, so forgive my ignorance. How does thermodynamics play into this? Once a few PJ of energy are sucked out of the earth, how is it replenis
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Does anyone know if there are any potential unintended consequences for this?
It's easy to lose sight of the fact that Earth is pretty big when compared to us measly humans. There's far more energy there than we could reasonably (or economically) extract even on time scales of a century or more. This ties in with your second question of how is the energy replenished. There are three main methods causing heat within the planet: nuclear decay, friction, and gravity. The decay of naturally-occurring radioisotopes releases heat and will continue to do so for thousands of years. Fri
Geee! Oh! (Score:2)
The title is clever, sky is the limit...for something deep underground.
We also would have accepted "Man finds hot hole; pushes his fluid injector in deeper and deeper"
...because removing energy (Score:2)
Good stuff. Until you scale it... (Score:2)
Oil was a great idea 100 years ago. Once we scaled it, we saw the error of our ways.
How would the Earth react if we sucked 50 years worth of oil energy out of it via geo-thermal? Anyone think there would be an effect?
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The sky's the limit? (Score:2)
For underground holes?
holy shit snacks (Score:3)
"But the biggest growth potential, according to the report, is in so-called "enhanced geothermal systems."
I've ranted before about how the generation facility at The Geysers is perpetually over budget, under specified production, has produced a super fund site and is working on another, and how pumping secondary treated sewage into the ground to keep the steam going has dramatically increased seismic activity to the point that a fund had to be established to pay regional homeowners for the damage to their homes, which has paid out hundreds of millions of dollars to date. Geothermal is a gigantic boondoggle, at least in the USA.
But now they want to open up new geothermal sources that are in hard rock? That's going to require fracking. Fracking is where they pump refinery wastes into the ground, then impact them in order to shatter the rock. Just in case any of you were confused about what "fracking fluid" is. (It's obvious when you look at the list of compounds in fracking fluid what it is.) This itself causes quakes, and also can create new means of ingress into aquifers which can cause contamination, not least with the fracking fluid itself.
Deep rock fracking was tried before, in France I think? I'm on a tablet right now, it's hard to look things up in a timely fashion. Anyway it was for geothermal and it created a severe quake. The same company proposed doing a similar deed near The Geysers for the purpose of building a new facility (that part of California is the world's most geothermally active region) but they were miraculously shot down by the typically uninvolved locals.
So in summary, geothermal in the USA is already FUCKING HORRIBLE, and exploiting these other geothermal sources would also likely be more of the same.
AKA Nuclear Fission (Score:2)
More than half of the heat in the earth's core is from active nuclear fission. So technically, the majority of the heat obtained from geothermal is the result of nuclear fission from an enormous reactor.
It's nuclear power. (Score:2)
It's just indirect nuclear power, as are solar, wind, hydro, and fossil fuels.
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Kinda improbable. By the time we did that the general population would be super-scientists by today's standards so we'd be well into the fusion era.
Read up... it's interesting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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You are making no sense. I've seen 0 evidence that the fission rate in the mantle is increasing. There's plenty of evidence of the greenhouse effect increasing, and newsflash dummy, thicker jackets are cooler on the outside than thinner ones.