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Re:Quaise Energy is working to create geothermal wells by donatj on Thursday August 04, 2022 @09:47AM (#32342839)
Thank you so much for the link, there is a lot in here that is genuinely fascinating!

For instance heat from the surface “thus penetrates only several tens of centimeters on the daily cycle and only several tens of meters on the annual cycle”

Re:Quaise Energy is working to create geothermal wells by ZeroGravitas on Thursday August 04, 2022 @09:59AM (#32342984)
This is why ground source heat pumps are suprisingly effective. You're drawing on the yearly solar inflow to the ground, at a depth where the temperature is quite stable, due to accumulating and averaging over years.
Re:Quaise Energy is working to create geothermal wells by DLTADragonHawk on Thursday August 04, 2022 @11:10AM (#32343935)
My curiosity in using things like heat pumps is that what happens when you move too much of that heat energy away. The heat might be doing nothing but, it has been there for a long time. At what point is too much heat displaced to the surface and what is the outcome of that?
Re:Quaise Energy is working to create geothermal wells by antisthenes on Thursday August 04, 2022 @01:47PM (#32345999)
You can read about what happened to the London underground over the years.

Except the process has been sort of reversed: there was heat being introduced into the deep layers of clay and rock.

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

Re:Quaise Energy is working to create geothermal wells by ZeroGravitas on Thursday August 04, 2022 @11:47AM (#32344464)
For them to actually work the energy needs to be replaced, flowing from the hot areas to the (relatively) cold areas, mostly coming from the sun.

If you have a small area and continually pump the heat out then you end up with the inside of a freezer, which uses the same tech for exactly that purpose, but also intentionally insulates to prevent the heat getting back in.