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Even though 3 different government organizations have given the thumbs-up, the environmentalists are still scared. They'd rather see the United States covered in ugly solar panels and wind farms.
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The most promising renewable energy of all is making pro-renewable Greens frightened and angry. It’s geothermal energy, which taps into the natural warmth below Earth's surface, providing an abundant heat source.
Geothermal exploitation used to be about finding and retrieving hot water – but new technology allows water to be sent into deep fissures several thousand feet down, where it meets hot dry rock, and comes out piping hot.
The problem? New geothermal techniques requires hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and environmental crusaders have convinced themselves that fracking is evil. Thanks to misleading propaganda such as the movie Gasland, campaigners fear contamination of the water table and apocalyptic earthquakes.
Using today’s technology, geothermal plants in North America would have a power capacity of three terawatts – three times the nation’s current electricity production capacity.
Of course, heritage Institute card-holding members will not be any near contaminated water wells and earthquake epicenters. What creation science idiot says that "geothermal energy" is renewable? It's not. There is fixed amount of heat trapped by Earth crust. The question about Nuclear reaction at the Earth core is open. Large scale geothermal projects would play with things we don't quite understand. Never mind the fact that large scale removal of heat would disturb crust stress equilibrium and that might result in Earthquakes. Injecting water to be superheated is the same as playing Russian roulette with Earthquakes etc. not speaking of possible water pollution.
it's time for mankind to pull its head out of the delusional rear and to admit that there are NO renewable energy sources that 7 billion strong population of hairless monkeys can tap into. NONE. Earth energy fluxes are in equilibrium (that includes solar and wind), and 7 billions strong energy hungry vampires cannot redirect powerful energy streams onto themselves without disturbing that fragile equilibrium with impossible to predict results. There is no silver energy bullet. The only (and I'm not kidding) technological "solution", it is a "warp" drive to spread the plague elsewhere.
Of course, heritage Institute card-holding members will not be any near contaminated water wells and earthquake epicenters. What creation science idiot says that "geothermal energy" is renewable? It's not.
Strictly speaking that may be true but in the real world...... LOL
The depletion aspect requires additional exploration and detail. Geothermal is often classified as a
renewable resource, but the time scale for its renewablilty is certainly longer than for solar, wind, or
biomass energy, which have daily and annual cycles. For instance, a fractured EGS reservoir is cooled
significantly during heat-mining operations over its normal project life of about 20 to 30 years, as a
result of heat-mining operations. If the reservoir was abandoned at that point, the rock would recover
to its initial temperature in 100 years or less (Armstead and Tester, 1987; and Elsworth, 1989 and
1990). With the time for full recovery of a former active reservoir approaching a century, one might
not categorize geothermal heat mining as a sustainable energy resource. However, as long as the
fraction of stored heat that is being mined in any year is a small fraction (<10%) of the total assessable
resource base, geothermal can be treated as fully renewable and, therefore, a sustainable resource. Given that the U.S. geothermal resource base is about 14 million EJ,we would always be utilizing
much less than 10% annually of the total thermal energy, even if all of our primary energy came from
geothermal resources.
If you had bothered to read both articles I posted you would have seen this type of fracking does not use the same chemicals as is used with oil.
As the article says: (pay attention to the bold print)
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This is because the most successful political movement of the past few decades, environmentalism, has relied so heavily on apocalypse: on the suspension of rational risk assessments, and the stimulation of wild, runaway fantasies. The equivalent of running into a room screaming: "We're all going to die! So do as I say." As a political technique it has been very effective, but it leaves proponents in something of a cul de sac.
Of course, heritage Institute card-holding members will not be any near contaminated water wells and earthquake epicenters. What creation science idiot says that "geothermal energy" is renewable? It's not. There is fixed amount of heat trapped by Earth crust. The question about Nuclear reaction at the Earth core is open. Large scale geothermal projects would play with things we don't quite understand. Never mind the fact that large scale removal of heat would disturb crust stress equilibrium and that might result in Earthquakes. Injecting water to be superheated is the same as playing Russian roulette with Earthquakes etc. not speaking of possible water pollution.
Agree, in a few tens of millions years the core will start cooling down and mankind will be out of luck....
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As a radioactive isotope decays, particles are ejected from its nucleus for the purpose of stabilizing the atom. Radioactive decay processes produce electromagnetic radiation (gamma rays, for example) which transmit energy from the nucleus to the environment. Additionally, the ejected particles have kinetic energy that ultimately converts to thermal energy as the particles are mechanically resisted by their environment. The crust, mantle, and core of Earth contain varying amounts of radioactive elements, the most important for heat production being Uranium-238, Uranium-235, Thorium-232, and Potassium-40, with half-lives of roughly 4.47 billion years, 704 million years, 14.1 billion years, and 1.28 billion years, respectively. From the half-lives of these isotopes and a comparison with the age of Earth, you can see that internal heat production via radioactive decay will likely persist at near current levels for quite some time to come.
Scott J. Badham
Department of Geology and Geophysics
University of Wyoming
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This is the same mentality as better not fly, the plane might fall out of the sky -or- better not drive you might get in an accident and pollute the environment with leaking gas or oil....
Quote:
it's time for mankind to pull its head out of the delusional rear and to admit that there are NO renewable energy sources that 7 billion strong population of hairless monkeys can tap into. NONE. Earth energy fluxes are in equilibrium (that includes solar and wind), and 7 billions strong energy hungry vampires cannot redirect powerful energy streams onto themselves without disturbing that fragile equilibrium with impossible to predict results. There is no silver energy bullet. The only (and I'm not kidding) technological "solution", it is a "warp" drive to spread the plague elsewhere.
It's hilarious that people make statements like "with things we don't quite understand" when it comes to fracking but are absolutely positively sure about things like global warming.....
Quote:
Earth energy fluxes are in equilibrium (that includes solar and wind)
And just where are the FACTS that show these "fluxes" are in equilibrium? Who determined this equilibrium?
Location: ๏̯͡๏﴿ Gwinnett-That's a Civil Matter-County
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Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think wind turbines are magnificent structures and a symbol of strength, independence and hope. A couple years ago I was driving through Northern Indiana and I saw where there were thousands of turbines being installed in farm fields along the interestate. I broke out into tears. Literally.... tears of joy. I stopped and took pictures and video. Then on the way back I was driving through at night and all the little red beacons were lighting up the sky. I recorded it on video and watch it whenever I feel hopeless for our country.
I later came to find out that parts of those very wind turbines are manufactured locally here in GA and providing jobs in my area.
And solar panels are also a thing of beauty. I would much rather see these things than more questionable mining and drilling operations
A huge amount of "Geothermal" energy can be recovered on a very small, household to small industry, scale by using "ground source heat pumps". These systems use the thermal mass of the ground to store or release heat depending on the season. In most cases more than three times the heat energy is transferred than the electrical energy used to power the unit.
I was interviewed for a position investigating geothermal energy complete with "fracking" the Hot Dry Rock heat source back in the '80's. Ronnie Raygun changes the Federal policies and my prospective job disappeared. Although there are relatively few places in the country where the geothermal reservoir is hot enough to generate electricity there are a lot more that could supply district heating. Given their proximity to some very hot magma I have wondered why, aside from political reasons, Hawaii has to burn oil to generate electricity.
In my opinion many of the “environmental” groups are shills for the existing energy suppliers and exist not to protect the environment but to protect existing business interests. They are mostly the deluded being led by the cynical or corrupt.
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Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think wind turbines are magnificent structures and a symbol of strength, independence and hope. A couple years ago I was driving through Northern Indiana and I saw where there were thousands of turbines being installed in farm fields along the interestate. I broke out into tears. Literally.... tears of joy. I stopped and took pictures and video. Then on the way back I was driving through at night and all the little red beacons were lighting up the sky. I recorded it on video and watch it whenever I feel hopeless for our country.
