Geothermal Energy

[norseman]

They have been drilling a borehole in the centre of Newcastle on Tyne for about a year. Yesterday a plume of steam burst out, so the project is well on it's way. The target is 2 kilometres where there is water at 80 degrees C. More power needed ? - just add a few more boreholes.
While drilling, being the North-East, they hit a huge previously unknown seam of coal at 660 metres and the bed of an ancient tropical sea at 1000 metres [coral, sea shells, etc]
This sounds a much better bet than ugly, intrusive wind turbines which produce little power and are a blight on the landscape. Geothermal power is green and clean and relatively cheap to utilise. Hot water up, extract the heat, pump the cooled water back down !

So now you know why Geordies never wear coats or shirts - the tropical sea is in our genes !

Originally Posted by norseman

They have been drilling a borehole in the centre of Newcastle on Tyne for about a year. Yesterday a plume of steam burst out, so the project is well on it's way. The target is 2 kilometres where there is water at 80 degrees C. More power needed ? - just add a few more boreholes.
While drilling, being the North-East, they hit a huge previously unknown seam of coal at 660 metres and the bed of an ancient tropical sea at 1000 metres [coral, sea shells, etc]
This sounds a much better bet than ugly, intrusive wind turbines which produce little power and are a blight on the landscape. Geothermal power is green and clean and relatively cheap to utilise. Hot water up, extract the heat, pump the cooled water back down !

So now you know why Geordies never wear coats or shirts - the tropical sea is in our genes !

I'm all for the use of whatever natural resources we can find. It's pretty unlikely, though, that geothermal is going to contribute any more than a tiny percentage of the nation's needs. That's the case for all of the green alternatives....

I was out running over the weekend and thinking about the new giant windmill turbines I can see in the near distance from the top of the old, now landscaped and tree-covered Sherwood pit tip. The new tip I can see from my home and it used to be a black hill at the side of the eyesore pit.

Are wind turbines really the blots on the landscape they're claimed to be? Well yes to a degree because there's never been anything there before, but then we've lost over the past 20 years all the pit headstocks and black tips which themselves were blots. The difference is that we'd become used to seeing them. I hardly need to point out a similar situation in the North East and many other locations in the UK.

Our tiny country is vastly overpopulated compared with how things were several decades ago and how things presently are elsewhere in the world. We are accustomed to - we demand - unlimited amounts of electricity and gas to power and heat/cool our homes. Coal and North Sea gas are all but gone but we're not gonna reduce our demands or trim our expectations. Alternatives all have their own problems - not a one can be a single replacement for what's already gone.

We're simply going to have to accept that our skylines are going to change because of wind turbines and that's one price we'll have to pay for the conveniences we demand.

The new generations will know nothing different, just as I knew nothing different from the pits that messed up our environment for decades.

Wind turbines will simply be an unremarkable and potentially vital part of the UK landscape just as pits were once unremarkable and undoubtedly vital.

In time all that may change and newer technologies may emerge - it's the normal way of the technological world.

Geothermal Energy supplies NZ with 10% of NZ supply - it still helps in a small way providing the geothermal fluids are not disposed into the waterways (high arsenic etc) and air emissions are carefully monitored.

Much better still than wood or coal fires!

[norseman]

Mac, my big issue with wind turbines is their inefficiency and low power density, also the siting which tends to be in places of great natural beauty. I look out of my window towards the Durham Fells and "blot on the landscape" fits exactly ! Also I notice that many of them are still. The "best" schemes have them sited off-shore. There have been proposals to build windfarms in National Parks and similar places - now that is a price NOT worth paying !
I have a suggestion - why not build huge windfarms in London and the Home Counties instead. Perhaps add a couple of nuclear power stations there also.

Originally Posted by norseman

Mac, my big issue with wind turbines is their inefficiency and low power density, also the siting which tends to be in places of great natural beauty. I look out of my window towards the Durham Fells and "blot on the landscape" fits exactly ! Also I notice that many of them are still. The "best" schemes have them sited off-shore. There have been proposals to build windfarms in National Parks and similar places - now that is a price NOT worth paying !
I have a suggestion - why not build huge windfarms in London and the Home Counties instead. Perhaps add a couple of nuclear power stations there also.

I accept your point about inefficiency but they're cheap enough to build en masse and although it's a shame that your personal view will be spoiled by them, our insatiable appetite for energy may mean they'll probably have to be built wherever - national parks et al if our overcrowded nation is to use renewables as much as possible.

Offshore is fine for you, less so for the coast dwellers who are likely to say the same about their views and low efficiency means that even further offshore, out of sight, brings significant other problems. What we gonna do?

I have no beef in building them wherever there's the wind to power 'em - I live in the north too. The whole of the country is fair game if we're going down the path of renewable energy - Home Counties, London and the south in general included. Absolutely NONE of us should be allowed to be nimbys without there being very exceptional circumstances - views may have to play second fiddle.

The world continues to change and we're unlikely to be able to protect totally the world we once knew in the UK. The whole globe is over-populated and these small changes we're discussing now are as nothing compared to some of the other changes that will have to come about as the global population heads towards the projected 9 billion by 2050.

We ain't seen nuthin' yet.

[norseman]

Or we could just reduce our power consumption
[ I can see the sea from my other window]

Mac, if views have to take second fiddle, I would argue that life would no longer be worth living.

And the turbines are still not turning !

Originally Posted by norseman

Or we could just reduce our power consumption
[ I can see the sea from my other window]

Mac, if views have to take second fiddle, I would argue that life would no longer be worth living.

And the turbines are still not turning !

Yes we could go back to living how I used to when I was a kid - is that what you're proposing because where would one set the bar?

Oh sure I love views too but if my #### is frozen solid in a winter like the last one, then I can survive without 'em.

You're lucky that you have views at all, let alone in both directions - most of the rest of us don't have any.

You're not a nimby by any chance, are you?

[norseman]

"You're not a nimby by any chance, are you?"

Absolutely !

Nah, I have always thought that windpower was a blind alley in power development UNLESS we had a small turbine [ like those on boats and caravans] on the roof of each house. Wavepower bears thinking about though given that we have about X000 miles of coastline. Also, I was looking at a small generator turbine [like a screw in a tube with a genny attached] , designed to be dropped into streams, rivers, etc - saw this in a Dales village. Also [endless supply of also's], we really should take a fresh look at coal. This country is STILL sat on top of massive reserves.
In the N.E. , we have more rivers than you could shake a stick at, so why are we not making use of them ?

Originally Posted by norseman

"You're not a nimby by any chance, are you?"

Absolutely !

Nah, I have always thought that windpower was a blind alley in power development UNLESS we had a small turbine [ like those on boats and caravans] on the roof of each house. Wavepower bears thinking about though given that we have about X000 miles of coastline. Also, I was looking at a small generator turbine [like a screw in a tube with a genny attached] , designed to be dropped into streams, rivers, etc - saw this in a Dales village. Also [endless supply of also's], we really should take a fresh look at coal. This country is STILL sat on top of massive reserves.
In the N.E. , we have more rivers than you could shake a stick at, so why are we not making use of them ?

Rivers? why not although our tiny rivers can only work locally - and then very expensive and probably uneconomic.....

coal? why not? Been saying for ages that our coal is mothballed until the time/price/situation is right - most promising in my estimation

wavepower? under development but still hugely expensive - what isn't though? need to be underwater otherwise negative visual impact

rooftop generators - been tried, not promising in the UK generally unless you live in a regularly windy region....expensive again - OK in a caravan/boat with battery storage and small power demand. Useless for heavier demands and consider the visual impacts for poor folks like me who live in housing estates which are already ugly and would become monstrous with generators on view.

[norseman]

"tiny rivers" - N.E. rivers originate on Low Fell in the North Pennines at around 2500 feet, then drop to sea level in a relatively short distanceso quite a steep drop-off with some good sites for a generator - large reservoirs already in existence.
This is worth a read, it's about those micro-aquagenerators
http://www.waterpowermagazine.com/story.asp?sc=2058305