Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by mrpg on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:00AM   Printer-friendly
from the energy-from-the-inside dept.

It's named after a Nordic god and drills deep into the heart of a volcano: "Thor" is a rig that symbolises Iceland's leading-edge efforts to produce powerful clean energy.

If successful, the experimental project could produce up to 10 times more energy than an existing conventional gas or oil well, by generating electricity from the heat stored inside the earth: in this case, volcanic areas.

Launched in August last year, the drilling was completed on January 25, reaching a record-breaking depth of 4,659 metres (nearly 3 miles).

At this depth, engineers hope to access hot liquids under extreme pressure and at temperatures of 427 degrees C (800 F), creating steam that turns a turbine to generate clean electricity.

Iceland's decision to harness the heat inside the earth in a process known as geothermal energy dates back to the 1970s and the oil crisis.

But the new geothermal well is expected to generate far more energy, as the extreme heat and pressure at that depth makes the water take the form of a "supercritical" fluid, which is neither gas nor liquid.

"We expect to get five to 10 times more power from the well than a conventional well today," said Albert Albertsson, an engineer at the Icelandic energy company HS Orka, involved in the drilling project.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:31AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:31AM (#505295)

    Giant straw stuck in the Earth is a sunk cost. You generate money for nothing. You give me money. Or I go luddite on your rig.

  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:36AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @03:36AM (#505297)

    Generate free energy from burning the homeless!

  • (Score: 2) by driverless on Saturday May 06 2017, @04:42AM

    by driverless (4770) on Saturday May 06 2017, @04:42AM (#505323)

    That's also why its called Thor, the earth is Thor after having a 4.7km straw poked into its epidermis.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @09:38PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @09:38PM (#505565)

    In the USA, we have The Alaska Permanent Fund as an example which has worked well since 1976.
    The mineral wealth beneath their feet is considered to belong to EVERYONE there, equally.
    Everybody in the state gets a check just for living there, as corporations pay[1] for the privilege of extracting that.

    [1] My state (California), like most, just gives it away for free.
    That's stupid gov't.

    Note that before the power grab of Capitalism put its grubby hands on things via the Enclosure Acts, [wikipedia.org] there was something called The Commons.
    It worked well for everyone.

    N.B. The "The Tragedy of The Commons" thing is a modern myth, spewed by the greedy Aristocratic class, sociopaths with multi-generational inherited wealth who want to keep that which they did not earn.
    The fact is that The Commons worked very well for centuries.
    (When maximizing profit for a few isn't the goal but maximizing societal wellbeing is, these things manage to work themselves out.)

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]