Australia Pushes Geothermal Energy

_martini_ writes writes to tell us Reuters is reporting that several Australian firms are experimenting with taking geothermal energy mainstream. Geodynamics Ltd. will be making an investment decision on their first geothermal power station in early 2006. From the article: "Mother Nature has been kind to us. Australia could be the world leader within the next couple of years given the geological anomalies present in South Australia," says Peter Reid, chief executive of another explorer, Petratherm Ltd."

Comments

Geothermal Is Expensive

[geomon]

There are several problems that geothermal energy will have to overcome before it can be used for any large-scale power production. First of all, geothermal solutions are terribly corrosive and the pipes are subject to scaling. The maintenance costs associated with keeping the plumbing working are high.

These are just a few of the problems associated with geothermal energy: the variable nature of the reservoirs and fluids; the depth, location, orientation, number and type of wells; the type and size of power plant; the method of disposal of the spent geothermal fluid and the need to conform with local environmental regulations.

Re:Geothermal Is Expensive

[DodgyGeezer]

How expensive is that compared with fossil fuels? With those billions of taxpayers dollars are spent providing security to ensure regular delivery of oil from their source. A price not reflected for instance in the prices at the gas pump. Then there is all the pollution that causes things asthma, contributing to medical bills.

Isn't This Dangerous

[MBCook]

Is this dangerous? I heard this on the radio today and that was what struck me.

So if we use this to power Australia like they suggest, what are the consequences. That would mean stealing a lot of heat from the Earth that is trapped in these geothermal "deposits" (since it sounds like they found concentrated areas of heat higher up than usual). If we cool those down (which is what will happen when we extract heat from them) then what will happen? Will it effect the ground in any way? I'm thinking of towns where they used to mine salt or coal or something and the ground later started to collapse because the stuff was gone. While they are not removing rock, would removing the heat cause problems later? For example: remove the heat -> things cool down -> rocks contract from cooling -> empty space -> fissues?

Anyone know? I realize this would probably be a long-term problem (not something that would show up for a long time). Would this not be a problem because the ground could slowly adjust as we removed the heat, or would the heat stay high until the last minute then plummet (sorta like batteries do) causing problems?

Re:Yellowstone

[Bad D.N.A.]

"I wish that they would do more around the yellowstone area" NO... leave yellowstone alone. And while your there, please catch and release.

Granite is radioactive.

[TapeCutter]

Australia does not have any major fault lines, no volcanoes and has some of the oldest (most stable) bedrock on the planet. The heat in the Granite is not from magma, it is from the low level radioactivity in the rock itself. A big enough chunk of granite will get hot all by itself. Check out the CSIRO, they have been working on this kind of "geothermal" for at least 10yrs. Their numbers say that one site with two deep wells (500m apart) would remain hot enough to replace the largest power plant in NSW for 50yrs. Intrestingly the site they got those numbers from was just a few miles from said power station.

The biggest problem in Oz is that coal is not only sprinkled everwhere so as to convieniently fuel our current power stations, it is also a major export. These two things combine to make the coal industry fat, lazy and influential.