12/6/21

Interest in geothermal energy heating up in Mountain West



In September the US Department of Energy awarded $12 million to seven projects intended to accelerate development of geothermal potential including $2 million to the University of New Mexico and $1.5 million to Montana State University. 

Geothermal mining has been a topic of keen interest in Montana for decades.

Last month the Bureau of Land Management sold a geothermal lease in Hidalgo County, New Mexico despite a 2016 blowout near a $43 million geothermal electricity plant erected by Cyrq Energy in 2013 when Republican Susana Martinez was governor.

Naming a dark matter lab 5000 feet below Lead after a lecherous, usurious Republican billionaire sticks in plenty of craws in South Dakota yet real science is getting done there. The Homestake Mine represents 8000 feet closer to the geothermal potential capable of powering much of the region. New Mexico's Sandia Labs, Los Alamos National Laboratory, South Dakota School of Mines and others are collaborating on exploring that limitless potential.
Picture this: you’re standing in a drift, 4,100 feet below the Black Hills of South Dakota. The drift you’re imagining is a research testbed on the 4100 Level of Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) and home base for the Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) Collab, a research group interested in extracting renewable energy from Earth’s deep, hot rocks. [To advance geothermal systems, EGS Collab maps the hidden fractures behind a wall of rock]
Colorado could tap orphaned oil and gas wells to supply hot water for electricity generation according to KUNC.

Learn more about the Cyrq Energy lesson at Searchlight New Mexico.

No comments: