May We Please Have More Energy?

I have written before that I don't like solar and wind energy. Now, I'm talking about on a large scale. If you want to put a wind generator on your farm or a solar panel on your roof, that is your decision alone. But solar fields and wind farms are not even a stop gap. They are just unnecessary.

There need be no great rush to get rid of fossil fuels. We have plenty. We are burning them cleaner than any other country in the world. And within thirty to fifty years, technology will solve our problems. Not that they are as great as the "Chicken Littles" would have you believe. Remember, there is money to be made in panicking the general public.

In the past I have told of the possibility of cold fusion as a power source. It is a good option as it is clean and non-polluting. But it does have one significant problem at this time. It requires quantities of helium three. Unfortunately the nearest source of helium three is the moon. Not that in time, that problem could not be surmounted. But it is a problem.

But the other day, I saw something new on geothermal energy. Geothermal energy is cheap, clean, and abundant in some areas. Iceland, due to the amount of volcanic activity there, thrives on geothermal energy. It is available anyplace hot rocks and water come together. Hot springs, geysers, and volcanic areas. 

But there is a new technique being tested. It is called "Hot Rock Geothermal Energy". The concept is simple. It comes within today's technology. It can supply the earths energy needs forever. A hole is drilled through the earths crust into the hot rock of the mantle. Water is pumped into this hole from any source available. The water fills the voids in the rock and gets very hot.

Around the central hole, a ring of holes are drilled that become steam vents, capable of driving generators. The condensed water is fed back to the source. Any steam that escapes will be recovered as rain. This seems like a perfect solution and it is very hopeful for success.

A thought that I had is that this might actually help to clean pollution from water. It would be burned of in the mantle and the condensed steam would be pure H2O.

When mankind has a problem, it is almost inevitable that the technology will be invented to solve that problem. It seems that we always have the brains and materials to solve our technical problems. We should do so well with our societal problems.