Google starts geo-thermal drilling
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SEARCH OUTFIT GOOGLE has decided that boring into the World Wide Wibble is not enough and it plans to start drilling into the earth's crust.
In a press release, Google promised nearly $11 million in technology to expand the nation’s geothermal energy reserves. A figure it points out is more than the US government, which is more interested in helping the oil industry, is stumping up.
The technology Google is interested in is called Enhanced Geothermal Systems, or EGS. This involves drilling deep underground to fracture “hot rocks” and then pump them with water to create steam that can be used in a power plant.
Google did a search and found that the accessible heat below the US has more than 2,500 times the nation’s annual energy consumption.
Google.org is the charity arm of the search engine outfit. One of the beneficiaries is Potter Drilling which is developing hard-rock drilling technology to be used for geothermal. It scored $4 million from Google.org.
Google has also invested in solar power plant companies BrightSource Energy and eSolar as well as in high-altitude wind company Makani. µ
Comments
Mmm
Well when global warming does finally kill off 90% of us, and those left see it fit to elect a hegemony to rule the new world, my vote's for Google!... Maybe that's thier plan all along? Seem like the do--no-wrong guys now, then bam! World domination!
Not what you think...
I very much doubt Google is doing this to reduce global warming or anything like that, although it is of course convenient for their PR if people assume that.It's probably just that they have seen their energy costs spiral across the globe, and are looking into energy sources that are/will be cheaper and more effective for them to utilise to run their vast amount of systems. If they can bypass the standard electric grid, they bypass the rising costs, the reliance on another provider, and could get a PR coup in the process.
They may or may not be evil, but they're definitely smart...
Be careful
There is a pilot line of this kind recently opened in france (alsace region). Fracturing rocks had initiated small earthquake (3 on richter scale), then they decided to inject chlorihdric acid to open the rocks ... The pilot line is now producing ~1.5MW