What an inadequate website for such bold claims. Here in New Zealand we found that geothermal is not "non polluting". There are a lot of unforeseen consequences with bringing deep water to the surface. Still much better than nuclear that makes our children pay for current consumption or coal that means we are paying for our ancestors consumption....
Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
21–30 of 98 posts
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am aware of the 2nd law. I am looking for data on the magnitudes involved. Every time there is a promise of very cheap energy, I wonder how we will deal with the waste heat.
The waste heat will be radiated away to space. The premise of global warming is that CO2 (and other "greenhouse" gasses such as methane) cause more of the heat to be retained in the atmosphere.
Yes, I am aware of the 2nd law and the greenhouse effect. I was asking about the magnitudes. It is okay if nobody has any idea about them.
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#23My response here is the same as what I say to proponents of new nuclear technologies: it's gotta work on a balance sheet , not just in a pitch deck. This isn't a new technology enabling new markets and new kinds of growth here, it's just... electricity. And even as a renewable option, it needs to be able to compete not just with fossil fuel generators with-all-the-externalities-factored-in, but with dams and windmill…
Geothermal power is a non-nuclear baseload source of energy though. Unlike all others, it just sits there and makes electricity/heat without other inputs: we should absolutely be throwing public money at it, we should've been doing this all along.
Geothermal that you can sink pretty much anywhere would be a gamechanger - it doesn't create local pollution, and it does produce waste heat: built in or neat town areas, you can make electricity and completely clean town heating that works all year round.
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
The waste heat will be radiated away to space. The premise of global warming is that CO2 (and other "greenhouse" gasses such as methane) cause more of the heat to be retained in the atmosphere.
Yes, I am aware of the 2nd law and the greenhouse effect. I was asking about the magnitudes. It is okay if nobody has any idea about them.
The magnitude is the same as current power sources that they would be replacing i.e. 100's of MWs to 1-10s of GWs. The amount of heat being brought up would have to be about the same as you would otherwise be getting from coal, gas etc and so the same amount of heat would be vent to the environment.
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
Any use of energy eventually results in heat; that’s just the Second Law of Thermodynamics in operation. But this effect is orders of magnitude smaller than the greenhouse effect.
I am aware of the 2nd law. I am looking for data on the magnitudes involved. Every time there is a promise of very cheap energy, I wonder how we will deal with the waste heat.
I cannot vouch for the quality of this model, but I remembered I had bookmarked this tweet, having wondered the same:
https://twitter.com/anderssandberg/status/145528744318439424...
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#26Stupid question but is it possible to cool the earth’s core if this tech was scaled out and used massively?
No. (1) because just how massive the Earth is a number you don't fully comprehend, and (2) because the Earth is actively warming itself from ongoing decay of nuclear isotopes which sunk to the center during it's molten phase, so really we're just tapping into a big pile of decay heat.
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#27There has been some effort on going to really deep depths in IDDP (Icelandic Deep Drilling Project) - see https://iddp.is/about/ If I remember correctly, they were never able to hit their goals because of drilling down into magma chambers. The steam coming up was also of a different scale than regular geothermal steam, causing corrosion that has not been dealt with before. As far as I know, the main problem is coming…
From what I saw on an earlier post about this technology is that the mm wave drilling technique actually causes the bedrock walls of the bore hole to turn to a type of glass and then no casing is needed. I will try and find the source on that.
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#28Stupid question but is it possible to cool the earth’s core if this tech was scaled out and used massively?
No. (1) because just how massive the Earth is a number you don't fully comprehend, and (2) because the Earth is actively warming itself from ongoing decay of nuclear isotopes which sunk to the center during it's molten phase, so really we're just tapping into a big pile of decay heat.
There's also a huge amount of internal friction created by the moon stretching and squeezing the earth, I believe that accounts for more heat than nuclear decay. Regardless, there's no way we can realistically impact planetary dynamics by blowing some cold water down tubes to the mantle, there's simply too much thermal mass - so yeah geothermal is a fantastic and reliable energy source.
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#29There has been some effort on going to really deep depths in IDDP (Icelandic Deep Drilling Project) - see https://iddp.is/about/ If I remember correctly, they were never able to hit their goals because of drilling down into magma chambers. The steam coming up was also of a different scale than regular geothermal steam, causing corrosion that has not been dealt with before. As far as I know, the main problem is coming…
MMW systems can potentially‘case-while-drilling’using rock melt or can post-drill install rock melt liners for significant well cost savings over steel casing and cement.
https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2014/02/f7/mmw_drill...
Re: Quaise Energy – Unlocking the true power of clean geothermal energy
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I am aware of the 2nd law and the greenhouse effect. I was asking about the magnitudes. It is okay if nobody has any idea about them.
The magnitude is the same as current power sources that they would be replacing i.e. 100's of MWs to 1-10s of GWs. The amount of heat being brought up would have to be about the same as you would otherwise be getting from coal, gas etc and so the same amount of heat would be vent to the environment.
The claims about geothermal and fusion are that they will make energy ridiculously cheap. Won't we use much more if it is cheap?