Hot Rocks, Cool Technology: Greener Than Wind or Solar, Geothermal Energy Gets Little Attention-Even Though, as Nick Schulz Writes, It Could Provide 2,000 Times Our Current Power Needs

Schulz, Nick, The American (Washington, DC)

A PROMISING, BUT LARGELY unrecognized, source of clean, renewable energy is right beneath your feet. It's geothermal energy, which comes from the super-hot rocks just under the Earth's crust. The United States is the global leader in geothermal, which provides about the same amount of power as the combined output of wind and solar energy, says MIT geophysicist M. Nail Toksoz. That's not much, but it could be a great deal more. Right now, geothermal gets little attention-from environmentalists, traditional energy companies, or governments.

This lack of attention is all the more surprising since geothermal is a greener source of power than either solar or wind. But if several intrepid scientists and engineers are right, advanced-technology geothermal will get the respect it now lacks.

The idea is simple--tapping underground heat to generate electricity. The Earth's core emits enormous amounts of heat, …

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Publication information: Article title: Hot Rocks, Cool Technology: Greener Than Wind or Solar, Geothermal Energy Gets Little Attention-Even Though, as Nick Schulz Writes, It Could Provide 2,000 Times Our Current Power Needs. Contributors: Schulz, Nick - Author. Magazine title: The American (Washington, DC). Volume: 1. Issue: 4 Publication date: May-June 2007. Page number: 88+. © 2007 The American, a Magazine of Ideas The American, a Magazine of Ideas. COPYRIGHT 2007 Gale Group.

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