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The time has finally come for geothermal energy

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160 points riordan | 1 comments | 17 Nov 25 13:55 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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hodgehog11 ◴[17 Nov 25 15:21 UTC] No.45954362[source]▶
I've always been curious why a cost-effective widespread implementation of geothermal energy has never been considered a holy grail of energy production, at least not in the public debate. Much of the discussion is so focussed on nuclear fusion, which seems so much harder and less likely to be reliable.
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hackeraccount ◴[17 Nov 25 17:39 UTC] No.45955903[source]▶
Harder absolutely but "less likely to be reliable"?

If economically viable fusion was "cracked" what would the nature of it's unreliability even be?

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1. pfdietz ◴[17 Nov 25 23:56 UTC] No.45959867[source]▶
The reactor breaking and taking a very long time to repair because the repairs would have to be done remotely, with robots. The structure becomes too activated for people to go inside, even after the reactor is shut off.

The reactor breaks because it's a large device operated at high stresses (power/area, neutron loading). There are many components and joints that can fail.

BTW, this means fusion will be expensive, because getting all those components to be reliable right off the bat becomes expensive. No tiny cracks in the welds means expensive quality control.