Saturday, June 30, 2012

New England Renewable Energy and Mercury Mechanical Services have helped bring on-line another federally funded geothermal system.

The heat pump shown here is just one component of a larger geothermal system. Altough no more visually impressive than an old computer terminal, the entire system produces more than 100 tons (100 x 12,000 BTUs), or 350-400kW of energy.

This federally owned location is strategic to national security. Perhaps analogously, government investment in technologies, such as geothermal, which are critical to long-term national security and economic growth can be illustrated by the US DoD investment in ARPANET starting from the early 1960's.

ARPANET formed the basis for today's internet and became arguably the single most important driver behind decades of public and private investment in computers and communication - what became known as the high-tech industry - the single major contributor to revitalizing our economic growth through the 80's and 90's.

3 comments:

  1. Nowadays geothermal energy was very useful to save the energy. It helps to produce the natural gases too.

    Yoder Geothermal installation

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hello Hamish,

      Thank you for your comments.

      There may be several broader definitions of geothermal energy, including the use of steam heat captured 1000s of feet below the earth's surface.

      The geothermal energy we refer to in this picture is that which is captured through the use of water to transfer under-ground energy (i.e. temperature - 55deg F).

      The heat pump literally extracts or pumps heat (energy) from the water loop supply - and returns colder water, thereby thermodynamically transferring energy.

      Delete