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What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

technologyreview.com

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Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#21
post #15

I worked on a mining project years ago where we had to dewater the mine of 90 degree Celsius water at 700L/s. Always wondered whether we can use it for energy….

You could use it for district heating of buildings in winter, but that's about it.

As the article mentions, you need to get above the phase transition between liquid and gas at high pressure (they mention 150c) to be able to reliably and quickly convert the thermal energy into kinetic, then into electrical inductance (gas expansion moving a turbine, moving a dynamo).

Maybe if you went into business making pot roast, you could cook meat low and slow, or set up massive dehydrators.

Running it under a shallow drying bed might make salt extraction from water evaporation faster, too.

Sadly, none of those things tend to be very close to mines.

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#22

Make drilling cheaper. This would also help with water access. The biggest cost of small geothermal and water projects is always the drilling. Drill rig time is always a limiting factor.

Yeah. We'd do 3"-6" wells at 450ft for hvac geo and it'd be 10%-30% of the project cost. I don't believe drilling has gotten cheaper in my lifetime.

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#23
post #17
post #16

They tried experiments fracking into hot rock in australia and went bankrupt proving the concept. Bit of a shame. More money got pumped into CCS which is demonstrably bloody useless, works for gas well life extension but not sequestration

To clarify at least two companies circa 2003-2013 successfully proved Australian geothermal could generate power at the 1MW level via pilot plants .. and had no futher investment or interest to expand further. Geodynamics writes off Cooper Basin geothermal assets https://reneweconomy.com.au/geodynamics-writes-cooper-basin-... Petratherm Ltd: https://www.energymining.sa.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/00... (now doing o…

Pulled out at the wrong time, the wellhead kit is probably buggered now. The qld government wasn't sufficiently keen, some say they make too much money from non renewable energy. Maybe times have changed now.

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#24
HVAC geo scales up. You could do a neighborhood utility and homes can heat/cool for the cost of air circ. You'll wind up with a novelty, an HOA that benefits every home (fees for for power/maint pumps).

A couple of generations ago, we had neighborhood sewage utilities all around here. Neighborhood geo seems less complex than that.

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#25
This interview with Fervo CEO Tim Latimer on the Volts podcast was really fascinating:

https://www.volts.wtf/p/enhanced-geothermal-power-is-finally

As a layperson I was certainly impressed by the notion that enhanced geothermal could get us the last x% of firm energy needed for a stable grid once solar+wind+batteries have gone as far as they can go.

Another interesting tidbit is that you can actually use their system to store excess energy from, e.g., wind and solar.

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#26
post #3

Does the widespread cooling of the planets interior have any possible consequences?

Scale wise, look at a cross section of an apple.

We live above the skin, all the drilling we have ever done at depth has yet to pierce the skin through to the white apple interior.

Any "cooling" we do would be preemptively use the heat within the apple skin that is already slowly radiating outwards .. and the pinpricks, or tens of thousands of pinpricks we might make would not cause "widespread cooling of the apples interior".

See: (actual geoscientists): https://www.ga.gov.au/ausgeonews/ausgeonews201306/geothermal...

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#27

Make drilling cheaper. This would also help with water access. The biggest cost of small geothermal and water projects is always the drilling. Drill rig time is always a limiting factor.

> Make drilling cheaper.

How?

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#28

Make drilling cheaper. This would also help with water access. The biggest cost of small geothermal and water projects is always the drilling. Drill rig time is always a limiting factor.

Drilling is supposed to get cheaper when it is done with microwaves instead of drill bits.

But the expense of maintaining the necessary steam turbine still makes it hard for geo to compete with wind and solar. This is also a major factor in the cost of operating a nuke plant, with similar effect on competitiveness. Really big steam turbines cost less to keep than a lot of small ones, but then you generally need to build two so you have a backup when one is down for maintenance.

Re: What it will take to unleash the potential of geothermal power? (2021)

#29

HVAC geo scales up. You could do a neighborhood utility and homes can heat/cool for the cost of air circ. You'll wind up with a novelty, an HOA that benefits every home (fees for for power/maint pumps). A couple of generations ago, we had neighborhood sewage utilities all around here. Neighborhood geo seems less complex than that.

This was tried using money for 2010 olympics in Whistler BC as the athlete accommodation was sold as subsidized housing to local workers after the olympics. The geothermal district heating project had many ongoing issues with repair costs being borne collectively by the new owners. Some saved $150/mo by removing it and switching to electric [0]

0: https://www.piquenewsmagazine.com/opinion/letter-to-the-edit...

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