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Helium Leads to Geothermal Energy Resources
Roland Piquepaille writes "When we think about alternative sources of energy, we often forget the potential of geothermal energy resources. In fact, it has been estimated that accessible geothermal energy in the U.S. represents 90 quadrillion kilowatt-hours or 3,000 times the country's total annual energy consumption. So far, it has been difficult and expensive to locate good sources of geothermal energy. But now, two U.S. researchers have found a new method which doesn't require drilling. They are using the ratio of helium isotopes in surface waters to point to the best sources of geothermal energy."
it's not in iceland as one might guess, it's in the philippines
on leyte, near lake danao above ormoc city, called tongonan geothermal field, run by calenergy
it's a pretty weird place: gorgeous virgin mountain forest, everything is muddy and foggy and it rains all the time there, as it's basically nothing but humongous turbines plopped right over steam vents coming right out of the ground. there are communist NPA guerrillas in the area and the security of the place is pretty important, so there are guys with submachine guns at checkpoints everywhere too
but, notably, some of the streams running off from the area are a brilliant cobalt blue
so just a reality check: some of the problems associated with mining will be found with geothermal sources. mining often churns up lots of unhealthy metals from the earth, artificially. well, geothermal is basically that same process, but completely natural. so whereever you have geothermal energy sources, you have the potential to stir up nasty metals and deposit them on the surface, with or without man's involvement
not my blog, but some good pics and summary
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_power
Of course, to completely replace oil, we would have to be able to use this energy for transportation. So, we still have some problems. Even so, if we drill ten miles deep almost anywhere, we will get useful geothermal energy. That means that we could use existing power plants because their generators are usually steam driven, or could be. We could get rid of our dependance on middle-east energy relatively fast. Canada could supply enough oil for our transportation needs until we can perfect the battery powered semi-trailer truck.
Additionally ggpp lacked any form of humor that I could detect.
Well, back to rejecting software patent applications.
Well, there was also the fact that his stories tended to be hype-filled press-release copy-paste jobs with sensationalized headlines but little real information, while the subject matter was typically mundane vaporware products or crackpot science. And yet somehow, his stories were accepted at an alarming rate. To his credit, lately they have been better. (Note that while his main story links are now direct, he still links to his blog from his name).
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I always wondered if it was possible to use the heat energy from active but somewhat stable volcanos. You would have a platform submerged in the lava pit and set up a system to run water through it to make steam and run the turbines. Is that feasible? What are the problems? I am guessing maybe the equipment might melt?
Yellowstone is about 60,000 years "overdue" for its periodic eruption, as the worlds largest volcano. When it goes, it'll render North America unfit for modern civilization, if past eruptions are any clue.
Geothermal energy comes from 2 sources, the primordial heat of the Earth's formation and radioactive decay. The former is clearly non-renewable, the latter is renewing constantly, whether we tap it or not. To say the source is SO HUGE that we could never cause any adverse effects is probably naive. But if properly studied, and keeping our geothermal appetite in proper check, it would be a great source of energy.
Back to Yellowstone... Somehow I don't think our power taps would be deep enough to truly fend off a Yellowstone eruption, but I wonder what sort of effect we would have on it? Would we mellow it a bit, or make it madder?
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Little point looking into geothermal environmentalists will just shut it down.
They have shut down wind farms (Nantucket Sound ala Ted Kennedy, and Walter Cronkite)
They are trying to reverse hydro-power (dam removal in the northwest)
They have killed off nuclear (oh, just pick one)
At some point you just give up and keep buying oil.
Really I don't think the environmentalists (a) believe what they say, and (b) actually want to solve anything.
Most of their actions are either just about narcissism and having something to bitch about (usually yelling at society when they really want to yell at their Dad).
If I thought they actually cared and were working to get things done, I'd be more supportive, but close interaction which the people has turned me very very off to their message.
It would be an economic issue but our current oil situation is being subsidized by the military (700 overseas bases) who we as taxpayers pay real dollars. But because of this, the true price of oil is hidden and not completely reflected at the pump.
If you had the U.S. Military either tax only the oil companies for the services they provide or had the oil companies provide their own defense, you would see a rise in gas prices and thus a shift away from oil into other technologies.
True. But it's not just oil, its fossil fuels in general.
You're right that geothermal cannot replace gasoline aslong as batteries suck as much as they do.
But if you could replace all -stationary- power-production, that'd still be a significant net win. Oil-powered electricity-plants, sure, but as you say, those are few anyway. Also gas-powered electricity-plants, coal-powered electricity-plants.
To the degree that people burn fossil fuels in order to heat their homes/factories that could also be replaced, indeed using geothermal heat for heat will give increased efficiency over using it for electricity-generation. You can even do both: the -cooling- for the electricity-plant can be used for -heating- elsewhere.
No single technology can solve the entire problem. But each technology can contribute to solving -part- of the problem.