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Scientists Attempt To Calm Volcano
An anonymous reader writes "Since May 2006, a mud volcano in Indonesia has spewed out up to 126,000 cubic metres of mud a day, flooding an area of more than 4 square kilometres. This unprecedented natural disaster has become so bad that geophysicists now plan to enact an untested scheme to try and slow the flow: dropping concrete balls into the volcano."
As one of the physicists said "The mud will find another way out". Maybe if they plug the hole, enough pressure will build up to cause a real eruption.
These events happen for a reason. It's the planet's way of staying in balance.
Ever have a bottle of soda suddenly start spraying? How well does sticking your thumb over the nozzle help?
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
So they demonstrated their theory using a water bottle with two holes cut in the bottom, and showed how covering one hole slowed the rate of water leaving the bottle. That's all good and fine, but we're talking about water that's responding to the force of gravity, not pent-up pressure and geothermal heating. If the weight of the balls can counteract that, great, but if that's their idea of a physically accurate analogy, I think they might be in for some surprises. Here's hoping it works, anyway, despite their faulty physics.
"Give a man fire, and he'll be warm for a day; set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life
So how, exactly, is this any different from the traditional volcano-god appeasement technique of throwing hundreds of naked virgins into the volcano? Apart from being less exciting.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
The think best effect this might have should be compared with a percolator coffee pot. Their approach is trying to reach a different means but it could have a positive effect for other reasons. And I beleive the solution they are trying is simular to the same process of a percolator even though they are only trying to block the channel the mud is comming from..
Now, If you examine a percolator you will notice a tube with a wide part at the bottom and narrower at the top. The large surface area of the heated part bring water to boiling wich then forces some up into the tube, Once the water burst out the top, it tips the tube letting fresh cooler water in to repeat the process. This volcano is simlar because it is spewing hot mud and not "hot lava". It probably isn't an actual erupting volcano in the sence that hot lava is in the bottom of the hole either. It is likley just a layer of bedrock or something with ground water sitting close by heated to an extreamly high temperature.
Imagine taking rocks and placing them in the bottom of the tube to displace as much water as possible were the heating element is. the reaction is going to be less water heated and spouted to the top. Eventualy the rocks will heat to some degree but the flow of water will also cool them so they sholdn't get as hot as the heating element.
The effect is that this volcano will take less water and materials in and push less of the same out. I don't think it will actualy plug the hole and slow/stop it from happening if it has any effect at all. Once more material is in the hole, Materials that make up the mud will also coat the balls proving an insulation layer that should slow the movment to the water even more from the change in heat disapation.
The scary part is that the push for enviromentaly friendly energy is running to a proccess simular to whats happening here. Geothermal electricity production can be done by drilling 4 or so miles into the earth were the heat is about 400 degrees and then pumping a coolant liquid into a heat echanger and the resulting steam would power generators. But we are purposing drilling deep enough and close enough to heat that we could run the risk of starting much of the same thing.
would be to explode a deeply placed high explosive device, in the range of kilotons.
Except for that tedious problem of obtaining, placing and detonating a few thousand tons of HE in the right spot deep down inside a mud volcano that is busily spewing mud upwards.
But that's just a minor engineering problem, isn't it?
You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.