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Do geothermal heating projects set off earthquakes?
Russia
Today
Monday, January 25th, 2010
While the question the title of this article poses might seem
like something from out of a Bruce Willis sci-fi action movie,
geothermal drilling triggering seismic activity is very much
the stuff of reality.
At least according to engineers from around the world, who
recently studied a seismic event which occurred in Landau in
der Pfalz, Germany. Some experts attributed the minor, 2.7-magnitude
earthquake to the “enhanced engineered geothermal system
(EGS)” that is providing heat and energy to the city.
But engineers working inside the facility claim that the accusations
are false. In their humble opinion, the shaking of the ground
beneath their boots was nothing more than the routine geological
activity according to the rules of Mother Nature.
Geothermal technology is derived by tunneling deep into the
Earth’s underground in order to tap into water that is
naturally warmed by the earth’s own heat. The water is
then pumped up to the surface where it is used as energy to
drive turbines that then generate electricity. EGS drilling
tech however, goes much deeper into Earth. The massive drills
bore through the bedrock and soil to depths of up to 10 kilometers.
The enhanced drilling technology seeks to fracture the deep
embedded rock and then pull out the heated water, bringing it
up to the surface.
The major benefit of the geothermal energy is that, unlike
oil or natural gas, it runs clean and is a sustainable green
energy source. But does drilling for the energy cause earthquakes?
According to the earthquake experts at the US Geological Survey,
seismic events occur when the stress that builds up from underground
fault lines is suddenly released. The resulting “shaking
of the ground caused by an abrupt shift of rock along a fracture
in the Earth,” is what is known as a fault. While deep
geothermal drilling is intended to unlock the potentially limitless
reserves of heat and heated water from the Earth’s depths,
it is the fracturing of the rock that has some engineers concerned
about upsetting the Earth’s seismic inclinations, especially
if the drilling is occurring too close to a seismic zone.
In a recent article drafted for ENR.COM, a popular trade magazine
for engineering professionals, engineers opposed to the proliferation
of EGS drilling are claiming that “fracturing the deep
rock can cause earthquakes if the fracturing is too close to
an active seismic fault zone.”
But Jefferson Tester, an MIT chemical engineering professor,
believes that concern over serious earthquakes due to engineered
geothermal drilling are unfounded. He backs up his beliefs by
pointing out that the oil and natural gas industries have been
drilling and fracturing the deep rock for decades without yet
triggering a serious seismic event. “Yet” being
the key word here.
However, according to Renewable Energy World.Com, it’s
these very same engineering professors and experts who have
no choice but to admit that “small seismic events known
as microearthquakes have been recorded and monitored in the
immediate vicinity of some injection sites. These usually have
Richter magnitudes of 2 or 3 and are ordinarily imperceptible
to people unless they are quite close to the epicenter.”
What’s more, it is said that these microearthquakes, although
triggered by geothermal drilling, pose no real “significant
hazard” to surrounding buildings and infrastructure, be
they homes, roads, bridges, commercial high-rises or, as in
the case of Landau in der Pfalz, Germany, power plants.
Optimistic professors like Tester who defend geothermal drilling
in order to tap into the Earth’s radiant core, are combating
the naysayers by publicly cautioning the world against “unbalanced
reports”. It is his professional opinion that, despite
the microearthquake that occurred in Germany and another in
nearby Switzerland, the intensity of the tremors caused by drilling
is not “alarming” enough to be considered a damage-causing
earthquake.
But one overriding question looms large: how inevitable is
it that a so-called microearthquake might one day chain-react
into a major earthquake of devastating proportions? With EGS
tech becoming more popular and more deep holes being drilled
down into the subterranean depths and more bedrock fractured
unnaturally, only time and Mother Earth know the answer.
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