Solar lasers, ocean power and volcanoes: unusual energy sources of the future | Cross River Real Estate
Fossil fuels are going to run out. This much we know. No one is entirely certain when they will run out exactly, but we know it will happen eventually.
Some estimates suggest we have about 70 years of coal, gas and oil left; the fossil fuel industry itself insists that we have significantly longer. But everyone agrees they will run out in due course.
So how will the world be powered when we can't rely anymore on fossil fuels? Why with volcanoes, waves, wet wood and solar power from space.
To compensate for the decline of traditional energy sources, researchers around the world are developing innovative new technologies that -- between them -- may provide a long-term solution to our rapidly growing energy needs. Some are familiar, some may seem far-fetched, and some could potentially pose as much of a threat to the environment as fossil fuels themselves.
CNN takes a look through some of the more interesting and unusual energy technologies currently under development.
Solar energy from space
The idea of collecting solar power from space has been under consideration since the 1970s. Putting solar panels into orbit offers a few obvious advantages over regular solar power such as not having to deal with atmospheric interventions (cloud cover and atmospheric gasses) and not losing any productivity at night.
In the past, trying to get a power plant to the edge of the Earth's atmosphere seemed deeply unlikely. But John Mankins, a former NASA engineer now with the Artemis Group has been working on a project that he believes will make such an audacious idea simple:
"The basic concept of the Solar Power Satellite (SPS) is to deploy a large platform in space near Earth," Makins says, "typically in a high orbit where the sun shines almost constantly, where it would harvest sunlight, convert it into electricity and then transmit it to receivers on Earth for use."
Some have suggested that lasers could be used to transmit the energy from space. Mankins says that in his view this is possible, but potentially dangerous ("think about the Death Star" he said ominously in an interview with Motherboard). Instead his project aims to use low-intensity microwave transmitters, which he believes will be safer.
Mankins says that the energy yield from a solar power satellite could be significant, potentially delivering up to 1,000-2,000 MW of power to the Earth.
To put it into perspective, he says "a typical home in the U.S. requires about 4-5 kW of power, or about 100 kW-hours per day, or about 3,000 kW-hours per month, or about 36,000 kW-hours per year. So a single SPS ... would -- for example - deliver power / energy for roughly 240,000-480,000 homes."
Some critics say the project would be prohibitively expensive or that getting something so large into space presents challenges. Others note that the energy yield is still not high enough to make the project worthwhile. Still, the fact that it is being considered by NASA lends it significant weight. So perhaps it is not so out of this world after all.
Mining volcanoes for power
Last year, work began on a new plan to extract heat from the hot rocks that lie under and around volcanoes. By injecting water into cracks in the ground, researchers hope that they may be able to create steam to power subterranean electricity turbines.
Two companies, AltaRock Energy and Davenport Newberry, were granted permission to test this procedure in the land around the Newberry Volcano in Oregon, in a process that critics argue is not dissimilar to the controversial technique of hydraulic fracturing.
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