Mormonism, the Anthropocene and the End of Civilization

[_SteelHead]

The problem is that the energy produced is not easy to export. It's more of a local solution. Geothermal electricity can be added to the grid, but can't be sent very far.

Quasi, help me understand this. Is there a reason that electricity generated by geothermal means can't be transmitted as far as Hydro electricity generated at Hoover Dam?

I work in the electric energy sector. There are interconnects for North America which allow the transmission of power across the regional ISOs and between the USA, Mexico and Canada. You can send power across the high voltage transmission lines across thousands of miles relatively easily. But there are limitations to transmission across distance (losses due to resistance), and you can't put electricity in a barrel and ship it somewhere where the power transmission infrastructure does not exist. This is the advantage of fossil fuels, they represent the stored energy from millions of years of sunshine in a readily transportable form.

You would be amazed at the sheer volume of natural gas - methane - swamp gas flared off at wellheads for the lack of gas distributing infrastructure. Lost potential energy at a huge impact to atmospheric carbon and methane levels.

[_Quasimodo]

The up side is that the sun shines just about everywhere.

Except in the minds of Mormon Apologists. (Forgive me father, I couldn't help myself).

It makes one wonder. What dark and smelly place (where the sun don't shine) have those apologists been keeping their heads?

[_Zadok]

It makes one wonder. What dark and smelly place (where the sun don't shine) have those apologists been keeping their heads?

Couldn't be up there, because DCP keeps trying to tell us that his crap don't stink. (Or words to that effect).

[_Quasimodo]

It makes one wonder. What dark and smelly place (where the sun don't shine) have those apologists been keeping their heads?

Couldn't be up there, because DCP keeps trying to tell us that his crap don't stink. (Or words to that effect).

[Guest]

Hydrocarbons, and nuclear could both be readily replaced in a short amount of time by geothermal. At a global scale. For the majority of electric energy production. Some nations are heavily invested in geothermal, the US is lagging in this field. Iceland, the Philippines, and Indonesia are areas of the highest geothermal growth.

Would you mind providing the source(s) for your statement regarding the potential for deployment of geothermal energy production on a global scale?

MIT/INL report on geothermal ( https://mitei.mit.edu/system/files/geot ... y-full.pdf ) -> characterizes the US's potential. We are not really unique geologically, so I am extrapolating for global potential.

Thank you for the reference. I had not seen this document. After reading it, I am not sure I would agree that geothermal could replace nuclear and fossil fuel generation in the US, as you seemed to suggest.

The report did mention the need for replacing the generating capacity represented by older coal fired power plants and some older nuclear plants that will be decommissioned in the near to intermediate term, and that geothermal could make a significant contribution towards making up for the resulting shortfall.

However, projections in the INL report referred to an economically and technically viable total of some 100 GWe for geothermal out of a total US nameplate generating capacity of approximately a Terrawatt (TWe).

While I certainly agree that geothermal is an under utilized resource and belongs in any future renewable energy generating mix, according to the INL report, we are talking about 10% or so of the present generating capacity here in the US.

Iceland, of course, is another story.

[_DrW]

I work in the electric energy sector. There are interconnects for North America which allow the transmission of power across the regional ISOs and between the USA, Mexico and Canada. You can send power across the high voltage transmission lines across thousands of miles relatively easily. But there are limitations to transmission across distance (losses due to resistance), and you can't put electricity in a barrel and ship it somewhere where the power transmission infrastructure does not exist. This is the advantage of fossil fuels, they represent the stored energy from millions of years of sunshine in a readily transportable form.

You would be amazed at the sheer volume of natural gas - methane - swamp gas flared off at wellheads for the lack of gas distributing infrastructure. Lost potential energy at a huge impact to atmospheric carbon and methane levels.

Absolutely. Images showing nighttime energy waste from flaring of light hydrocarbon gasses, generated at oil and gas well installations and refineries worldwide, make one stop and think.

These images show exactly what you are talking about.
http://geology.com/articles/oil-fields-from-space/

Note that in some areas the intensity of the light from oil and gas field activities rivals that of nearby cities. In many of the images shown, the light from oil and gas fields is mainly from flares, especially in the Gulf States, North Africa, and offshore in the Gulf of Mexico near the Mexican coast.

While it is technically possible to capture and compress a good portion of this gas to create Liquid Natural Gas, the infrastructure for loading, transporting, offloading and safely storing LNG has not been fully developed, and so the stuff just gets burned by flaring (and in many cases not very cleanly).

[_SteelHead]

I've been toying with the idea of getting into the "make use of flare gas" business by plopping 1mwh ng to swamp gas powered trailer based generators on the well pads and hooking them into the grid. Most of the time the power lines are already pulled to the well pads, and then at least the flaring is put to some use......

[_SteelHead]

One of the findings in the geothermal paper is that there is 2000 x the energy consumed annually by the US fairly readily available. It is not as cheap per kWh currently as fossil based fuels, but in the long run the environmental mitigation would justify (at least in my opinion) significant resources towards the development of more geothermal energy.

There are numerous energy sources available going forward, the amount of energy stored as methane hydrates in the continental shelves, and under the permafrost is impressive. But they do not avoid the ecological impact problem. I think cheap, readily extractable fossil fuels are feeding the problem of climate change, and the long term storage problem around nuclear are .... while not intractable, troubling. At some point energy policy for the planet needs be driven by sustainability....... The question becomes will we make the transition in time?

[_Brackite]

2014 becomes Sweden's warmest year on record