5/16/15

Sen. Tester to introduce geothermal plan



Geothermal mining has been a topic of keen interest in Montana for decades.
Montana Senator Jon Tester is aiming to introduce a bill that would set a target of generating 50,000 MW of geothermal energy by 2025. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) currently has over 800 geothermal leases but only 59 have the status of currently producing, totaling about 1500 MW of geothermal capacity on public lands, with about 1.5 million homes receiving electricity from them. Some research has indicated that enhanced geothermal systems could enable developers to expand geothermal up to 100,000 MW in the coming years and Google has investing in this technology. [Climate Action]
More on the Google-backed Newberry volcano geothermal test linked here.

In 2010, some of the country's American Indian nations were left without power for many weeks because utility companies have succumbed to the moral hazards of disaster declarations that pay them to replace ice-downed power transmission lines year after year.

Oregon Public Broadcasting has compared hydraulic fracturing for geothermal versus for natural gas.

Utah's former GOP governor, Jon Huntsman set that state on a course toward geothermal power generation.

Cyrq Energy built a geothermal electric generator in New Mexico that is now online.

The Santa Fe National Forest on Wednesday announced plans to study potential environmental impacts of developing geothermal energy: Santa Fe New Mexican.

Above map courtesy of the Union of Concerned Scientists.


3 comments:

Bill Dithmer said...

I thought I'd read everything you had here but I guess not. The shearing technology looks like it would work for hot artisan tha come within a hundred feet of the surface. Hell they might even freeflow again.

The Blindman

larry kurtz said...

Did you see the big red spot over Winner, Bill? Philip and Midland sit on a lake of hot water.

Anonymous said...

Yep, several SD counties sit over a bed of hot water - yet the state is too stubborn, stupid, or both, to develop it.