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Iceland Eyes Liquid Magma As Energy Source
An anonymous reader writes "Scientists in Iceland have been studying and utilizing the power of geothermal wells for years. In 2009 one such study hit a standstill when a group ran into magma halfway into their dig. The roadblock has become a blessing in disguise, as recent research has shown that the magma can act as a potent new source of geothermal energy powerful enough to heat 25,000 to 30,000 homes."
Damn right! If man were meant to fly, he'd have wings!
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
There are a few supervolcanoes around the world. Yellowstone has been going off about every 3/4 million years for around 20 milllion years, and it's due. Toba nearly wiped out humanity 75000 years ago. Can we do anything about it? Defuse them by sucking all the power out of them with geothermal energy extraction?
No. Luckily, we can't. Also worth noting that tidal power plants won't eliminate tsunamis, wind power won't prevent hurricanes and solar power isn't going to reduce skin cancer. And more importantly, if any of those were likely to have such drastic effects then it would be a really really Bad Thing to Do.
As opposed to what? Solid magma is more commonly called "rock".
I imagine that you would have two somewhat vexing problems: One, as you note, temperatures high enough to melt rocks are pretty hard on most machinery. Two, while extremely hot, magma has a distinctly finite amount of energy available. Once you get serious about extracting heat, it will cool and solidify. Once solidified, it will be a mediocre conductor of heat. Thus, unless you want to get only toy amounts of energy out of the system, you will need a fairly large surface area exposed to the magma.
The human harvesting of geothermal energy is totally insignificant compared to natural cooling over the entire surface of the earth.