Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by version_five on Saturday January 22, 2022 @10:44PM
(#30043420)
The most interesting part or me was that the diamond came from 600km below the earth's surface. Maybe this is common knowledge, not for me. It's pretty cool to think that we have access to such things. If we could dig down that far, would there be an abundance of diamonds?
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Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by djdjfhsje33edh on Saturday January 22, 2022 @10:52PM
(#30043466)
The article says the diamond formed at that depth, but I assume the rock rose to a higher depth before it was extracted. I believe the deepest depth to which we have drilled is on the order of 10 km.
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by JshWright on Saturday January 22, 2022 @10:55PM
(#30043487)
The Kola borehole, drilled by the Soviets, is the deepest we've ever drilled, at 12.2 km.
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by franga2000 on Sunday January 23, 2022 @03:13AM
(#30044516)
I've alway wondered why they never went deeper. Turns out the answer is in hindsight obvious, but very unsettling:
> The unexpected decrease in density, the greater porosity, and the unexpectedly high temperatures caused the rock to behave somewhat like a plastic, making drilling nearly impossible.
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by alan-crowe on Sunday January 23, 2022 @10:03AM
(#30046609)
We could use the unexpectedly high temperatures as a heat source for geothermal energy. Make money selling the energy for ten, twenty years,... until the temperatures fall and the rock becomes rigid. Then drill another kilometer, funded from the geophysical exploration budget.
Temperature too high again? Have a long pause to make a little money from geothermal energy.
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by neurostimulant on Sunday January 23, 2022 @10:35PM
(#30053432)
Geothermal plants can trigger earthquakes [1], so it's probably unwise to build a lot more geothermal plants to meet global energy needs without addressing that risk first, especially near populated areas.
[1] https://news.stanford.edu/2019/05/23/lessons-south-korea-sol...
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by kubafu on Sunday January 23, 2022 @02:42AM
(#30044381)
To save you a search https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kola_Superdeep_Borehole
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by stavros on Sunday January 23, 2022 @06:36AM
(#30045435)
My favorite thing about that hole is that we always imagine it to be human-sized or something, but it was as wide as a football or so.
Re:Diamond hauled from deep inside Earth holds never-before-...
by markdown on Saturday January 22, 2022 @11:25PM
(#30043615)
There's an abundance of diamonds right here on the surface (or near it). Diamond supply is artificially constrained.