Post
Topic
Board Project Development
Re: Why Geothermal Energy is simply better for mining
by
Adam4Eve
on 28/02/2019, 17:58:14 UTC

Most geothermal resources are along tectonic plates, or the well defined 'Ring-of-Fire'



In that case, are these plants insured against natural calamities? What is the contingency plan for, say if one of your plants triggers an earthquake or is affected by one?
This is a leading cause why geothermals aren't very popular. Generally if you screw up in any other sector, you only lose money, here you are potentially risking a large populous.
For example; Quake Threat Leads Swiss to Close Geothermal Project

Besides, what are the preventive measures planned for greenhouse emissions?

Without a doubt, the power plants will trigger earthquakes. They will most likely not be affected by earthquakes, however.

I think is is important to remember there are literally thousands of earthquakes daily, the majority of which you will not feel (have little impact on anything). The evaluation of an earthquake works on a Richter Scale, which is logarithmic such that a magnitude 2 earthquake is much different than a magnitude 3, although they both do sound scary, there isn't much harm until you get to about a magnitude 5 or larger, which is extremely rare.

In the citation you mention, the earthquake was trigged by a technique called "Enhanced Geothermal Systems".
https://www.energy.gov/eere/geothermal/how-enhanced-geothermal-system-works

In this scenario, scientists and engineers essentially create their own geothermal reservoir though "hydraulic fracking". As you can image, this causes the generation of earthquakes, but most are harmless. The leader of the Swiss project cited in your article made a big mistake of drilling directly into an active fault, which when lubricated with hydraulic fracking fluids, cause slip on the fault easier, generating more earthquakes.

These concerns can now be mitigated with advanced reservoir characterization technologies to prevent the drilling of wells into active faults.