Can you drill into Yellowstone like the Gulf and tap that geothermal energy and use?

It is possible, but federal laws prohibit drilling for geothermal energy in yellowstone park. Not to mention, I don't think I'd wanna be there when they drill for hot water and accidentally hit magma. The magma in some parts of the park is very shallow, in some places only a few thousand feet down.

no



can't use

Ofcourse it is possible, but it is a unique engineering feat and should be addressed as such. The yellowstone caldera could easily power every form of energy concern on the earth currently. Just tapping into one of 30 or so hotspots could power the united states.

The problem is people do not have an imagination nor the information required to have such an imagination so there will always be tons of nay sayers to this idea.

Actually you might want to research the geyser they say have been causing earthquakes here because they are drilling

This video that was published about a month ago is Max Keiser on BitCoin in El Salvador. It is 62.6 minutes long. A very interesting sidebar is that El Salvador is looking into geothermal energy. Max cites the Iceland example as something to be emulated.

Any geothermal asset anywhere can be so emulated. In Hawaii they are using propane as a working fluid rather than water. I suspect this is a more efficient system. Other fluids have been used in heat pumps including ammonia (which is somewhat corrosive and explosive) and carbon dioxide.

I worked at Yellowstone in 2019. Believe me the infrastructure and roads would never allow the size of machinery you would need. The whole park is a double loop like a figure 8.

I wept when last year the rain killed a lot of access and knew what a head ache it would be to rebuild.


I worked out of West Yellowstone Montana. Very cool. I loved Bozeman too. I called it the big little city. Would drive up there and think of Star Trek how that’s where first contact with the Vulcans happened

They've been drilling into Yellowstone and other volcanoes for years

Yellowstone a world heritage site and is not to be developed.

on a more practical note, the shallow magma needs a plastic behaving rock (hot) above it to allow the magma chamber to wax and wane as it goes through cyclic episodes. if one were to drill and extract this shallow heat, it would make the crust more brittle and prone to cracking during these cyclic episodes. a large or sudden crack could allow the hot fluids below to start a cascade as the shallow pressure rapidly falls, fluids erupt, and the pressure holding the magma chamber from erupting collapses. Yellowstone is a super volcano and such an eruption would continental in scale.

some things in nature are best observed, not bent to the will of man.

In the 1970s the government sold all of its geothermal sites all across the country they were all bought. by the oil companies the oil companies have been sitting on them with no development ever since.

Nothing says human stupidity louder than perforating the surface of an active super volcano just so we can have the electric power to watch tv and listen to the government tell us why it's a great idea.

Also this thread is from 2010. We're a little bit late on the conversation.

They should just tap into the Bitcoin farms the hot water from those could power a generator and run a small town.

Lol.

Leave the supervolcano alone.

Hey, I know - lets make the nation dependent upon one power source built on top of an active volcano.

It would probably cause a disaster which
would destroy the western 2/3's of North America.
Which i suppose would be a public service !!!
Yet i have fond memories of Yellowstone.
When i was sixteen my family was in Yellowstone
when my Father had his first massive heart attack.
My Mother emptied the cash she and Dad had into
a envelope and gave it to my brothers and i and
then got into the ambulance with my father. My
older brother took the cash. Put on some clean
clothing and took off to some town near the park.
Leaving my younger brother there and alone in a
abandoned camp grounds. I have to admit that it
was the most incredible adventure of my life.
My younger brother and i had been in the scouts
and had suffered off grid camping trips so we
knew how to survive....lol. We also knew how
to hike and how to get to the hospital my father
was at. And cool enough not to mention why our
older brother was not there also.. even make
up excuses why. In hind site it was the greatest
adventure of our lives. Mom soon figured out what
my brother had done. And started to make plans
for us to get back home with out telling my
father what had occured. But my older brother
returned before that was necessary and promised
to drive the car and us back home. As he was due
to go back to college. So he did. My mother never
forgave him ... but my younger brother had to
agree that thanks to that older brother we had
the adventure of our lives.

Great story and I'm glad it worked out well for you two boys. Your mother knew just how irresponsive that was, but if she is still around you might tell her your side of the story.

Not sure but I think there is such there already.

Yes...

Four different configurations for using geothermal resources:

[link to www.geo-energy.org (secure)]

Chico Hot Springs at Pray Montana uses the Yellowstone area geothermal to heat pools, a greenhouse, spa, hotel, and restaurant. A potential vacation destination:

[link to www.chicohotsprings.com (secure)]
Greenhouse: [link to www.chicohotsprings.com (secure)]

Geothermal maps (US dept of energy):
[link to www.energy.gov (secure)]

Just took a road trip to yellowstone.

As soon as I was at that beautiful, yet smelly fart hole, I realized that they could have used that site as a way of creating perpetual geothermal energy.

I ALSO learned that yellowstone was the FIRST national park, made to be protected and left pristine.... by none other than J D. rockefffelller himself, who accomplished this by underhanded means....

WHY?

Because he knew that if they turned Yellowstone into a power source, it would ruin his oil business.

SO what did he do? He turned the greatest power source in the United States, into a tourist attraction that everyone would DRIVE and burn oil to go and see.

The psychopaths in charge do have a sense of humor.

Next-generation geothermal tech will drill deeper than ever before

[link to www.futuretimeline.net (secure)]

Tourists don’t want to visit a hydrothermal power generation plant unless you do it big like the Hoover dam

Warming Up to Geothermal’s Potential Via Google Earth
[link to www.renewableenergyworld.com (secure)]

Work a bit slow today? And did you ever wonder just how hot it is miles beneath your cubicle? Luckily, the good folks at Google have you covered on both fronts.

Welcome to geothermal data heaven. Researchers at SMU’s Geothermal Laboratory have built a vast database detailing the geothermal potential way, way below the earth’s surface, and Google has taken that information and laid it atop its interactive Google Earth platform.

Spend a little time with it — or a lot — and you’ll end up with all sorts of nuggets that will help you better understand Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) and its immense potential in the United States. The experience will certainly give you a better sense of where the hot spots are. You probably didn’t need Google Earth to tell you that Firehole Lake in Wyoming was a rather good source of geothermal energy. But did you know that places like Louisiana and Mississippi also pack their fair share of heat? Or that West Virginia’s geothermal resource is equivalent to the state’s existing king of power — coal?

The goal of the 35,000 data sites is to help users deepen their knowledge of geothermal potential in areas not often associated with the energy resource. As technologies improve, methods such as EGS may one day tap into this often undiscovered source of clean energy.

In the meantime, you have some exploring to do. First, download the latest version of Google Earth and then download and open the file.

Southern Methodist University Geothermal Lab;

[link to www.smu.edu (secure)]

Our expertise includes:

Academic research by faculty, staff, and students
Geothermal Maps such as the Geothermal Map of North America
Projects, such as the National Geothermal Data System, the Enhanced Geothermal Potential of the Cascades, the Geothermal Synthesis of Dixie Valley, Nevada

Current research on temperature logs for climate change, the stability of methane hydrates along continental shelves, co-production and distributed geothermal generation
Well logging with high precision Temperature-Depth measurements

Sample analysis of Thermal Conductivity measurement for commercial clients

The Lab assists the public through:

Our Power Plays conference, Geothermal Energy in Oil and Gas Fields

K-12 classroom materials
A monthly newsletter on the geothermal, oil/gas, and energy industries
Research and travel updates on our blog
Publications and papers for those interested in learning more