News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill deep enough. Parent comment

Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by semi-extrinsic on Saturday February 26, 2022 @05:48AM (#30476612)
Don't worry, we were doing nuclear fracking back in the days. Everything that could work has been tried for oil and gas exploration.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Gasbuggy

Regarding drilling operations that destroy value: you're forgetting that drilling is 1D while oil fields are 3D (technically quasi-2D with horizontal dimensions 100x to 1000x larger than vertical dimensions). If your drilling messes up everything in a 10 meter radius from the drill string, you don't care.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by yjftsjthsd-h on Saturday February 26, 2022 @02:55PM (#30481199)
> Don't worry, we were doing nuclear fracking back in the days. Everything that could work has been tried for oil and gas exploration.

Likewise, everything that conceivably could be done with nuclear was tried or at least designed for a while there - lighting watches with radium, digging canals with nukes, space travel by continuously exploding nukes behind you... good times. (Horrifying times, but w/e;])

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by CRConrad on Monday March 07, 2022 @05:55AM (#30586310)
> Likewise, everything that conceivably could be done with nuclear was tried or at least designed for a while there - lighting watches with radium, digging canals with nukes, space travel by continuously exploding nukes behind you... good times. (Horrifying times, but w/e;])

"The top secret plan to explode a nuclear bomb in Yorkshire", by Tom Scott: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceWZslOfEjs

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by dhosek on Saturday February 26, 2022 @03:26PM (#30481575)
Not to mention https://gajitz.com/1950s-radioactive-science-kit-most-danger...
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by joshuacc on Saturday February 26, 2022 @09:59AM (#30478037)
Why do you think that drilling is one dimensional? Drilling at an angle, and even at gradually changing angles is common.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by tomrod on Saturday February 26, 2022 @11:01AM (#30478642)
Technically embedded in that case, as your drill line can be represented (often) by a single parameterized function.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:You can have geothermal power everywhere if you drill dee... by semi-extrinsic on Saturday February 26, 2022 @05:12PM (#30482463)
Exactly. Unless you plan to zizag around all over the place, most of the reservoir won't be in the near-well region.
[ Parent | on HN ]