Energy : The Causes And Impacts Of Geothermal Energy

As a tectonic plate slides into the mantle, the heat releases fluids trapped in the plate. Seawater and carbon dioxide, rise into the upper plate and can partially melt the overlying crust, forming magma. And magma most likely means volcanoes are around.

Some advantages to using geothermal energy are: potentially an unlimited supply; does little damage to the environment; does not produce air pollution; does not require any additional structures (solar panels or windmills) to collect the energy; and it does not need to be transported to the power plant. The major disadvantages to using geothermal energy is the need to dig deep below the surface causing damage to the soil when drilling test wells, availability is limited; and there is not much power per vent. This type of energy source would only be available in the Philippines, Indonesia, Mexico, countries of Central and South America, countries in eastern Africa and in eastern Europe, Italy, Iceland, New Zealand, Japan, France and very few places in the United States, mostly in California and Nevada (www.altenergy.org).

Some people view volcanoes as great land formations to live by because they produce geothermal energy. Geothermal energy means natural energy form the earth. The energy that is made is steam that is very hot which has to be filtered first due to all of the bad ash particles and bad gases that are in the steam. “Countries such as Iceland make extensive use of geothermal power with approximately two thirds of Iceland’s electricity coming from steam powered turbines” (The Geography

The Earth’s outer crust is made up many tectonic plates that move over the surface of the planet. When the plates come collide, volcanoes will form sometime (National Ocean Service). Volcanoes can also form in the middle of a plate, where magma rises upward until it erupts on the sea floor, at what is called a “hot spot” (National Ocean Service). A hot spot is a plume of magma or molten rock that rises from within the Earth then reaches the surface forming underwater volcanoes which may grow tall enough to

Initially, earthquakes shape the Earth’s surface by creating mountains and geysers. In the article “Historic Earthquakes,” it reads, “High intensities were observed in the northwest section of Yellowstone National Park. Here, new geysers erupted, and massive slumping caused large cracks in the ground from which steam emitted” (Stover 3). Consequently, when the geo-process of earthquakes occurs, it molds and changes the earth by creating new geothermal

Some rock’s in the Earth’s interior that are solid, are so hot that, if the pressure on these were released, or they are convected into a lower pressure zone, they could begin to melt

More than two years after the 2010 earthquake, Haiti’s energy supply remains a significant challenge. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), Haiti’s 2007 per capita energy consumption was about 1/10 as much as that in the neighboring Dominican Republic, and about 1/24 the global average. The Western Hemisphere’s poorest country is on the same level as war-torn Afghanistan. The country needs new energy for sustained economic development (www.worldwatch.org).

Hawaii has at least 50 renewable energy projects spread over five islands, including the state’s only geothermal power plant on the eastern rift zone off the Kilauea volcano.

According to Middlemost (1988)’s basic definition, magma is a heated rock-forming substance that is created within a planet and exists only below Earth. When magma escapes to the Earth’s surface and is extruded, they are known as lavas. Grotzinger and Jordan (2010) suggests that magma mainly comes from the asthenosphere- the upper part of the mantle.

Magma frames in either the lower bit of Earth's hull or the upper piece of its mantle. It is delivered when high measures of weight join with high temperatures, bringing about a percentage of the stones in the range to liquefy, making this substance. Without this blend of weight and warm, this substance would not have the capacity to shape.

The process of the formation of igneous rocks begin all the way down in the Earth's mantle. The mantle consisted of hot magma that is constantly moving due to the convection currents. Convection is the heat transfer of liquid and gases .As the bottom of the mantle begin to heat up, the magma rises to the top because it becomes less dense. Once it reaches the top it cools off and becomes more dense and fall back to the bottom and the cycle of convection begin again.

Alternative energy has been a major focus of many countries for a few decades now in order to

The Earth is constantly moving and this causes both earthquakes and volcanic eruptions to take place. As the plates drift and collide into each other, pressure builds beneath the surface of the earth. If it occurs near a fault, then an earthquake results. If the pressure is near a volcano, then the volcano will erupt. Sometimes the surface near a volcano will experience many small earthquakes before an eruption. The amount of pressure that is built up from the plates moving causes damage to the Earth’s surface. This can be seen at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The seafloor is spreading apart in the Atlantic Ocean which is pushing the plates apart. The surface that is experiencing volcanoes from this is Iceland.

The International Energy Agency estimates that by the year 2003 forty percent of the world's energy production will be from sources other than fossil fuels or nuclear power. Nevertheless, the need for

Government-funded research into obtaining geothermal energy was greatly dynamic in the 1970s and early 1980s. However, as oil prices declined in the mid-1980s, alternative energy sources declined, thus, funding for geothermal energy research greatly reduced. Consequently, this monetary difficulty stifled any advancement on geothermal technology. "Now that energy concerns have resurfaced, an opportunity exists for the U.S. to pursue the EGS [Enhanced Geothermal Systems] option aggressively to meet long-term national needs," as observed by MIT Professor Jefferson Tester (MIT, January 22, 2007, para. 19).