Just 2 Degrees: Can Geothermal Topple Oil?

Just 2 Degrees: Can Geothermal Topple Oil?

just ahead there aren’t many sources of
power as renewable as the heat benath
our
feet on this episode we look at
geothermal its sustainability
practicality and cost it’s effectively
an unlimited source of energy and
climate case against the Swiss
government sets an enormous precedent
after elderly women argue the health
risks brought on by global warming
violates their right to life the track
we are on is more on 3° global warming
just 2 deg is on now I’m now
76 and now I know my daughter doesn’t
like me to say this but statistically
speaking in 10 years I’m gone so it’s
not I and my generation that profit from
what we gained today the next
Generations
[Music]
you know I
do I know I got it I got it I
Do We Begin this episode taking a look
at an energy source beneath our feet
that could help Propel us to
sustainability it supporters say it’s a
clean renewable source of low carbon
energy that could play a vital role in
tackling the climate crisis the
potential of geothermal energy seems
enormous if estimates are correct then
Geo is 50,000 time times more powerful
than all oil and gas
resources you may have soaked in a
natural Hot Springs pool or witness the
Old Faithful Giza blasting hot water
into the air at Yellowstone National
Park but have you ever wondered where
all that heat comes from well it all
lies deep below the Earth’s crust and is
called geothermal energy in volcanically
active areas close to tectonic plate
boundaries it’s been used for decades to
supply renewable Heat and electricity in
dozens of countries at tectonic plate
boundaries water breaks through the
Earth’s surface with steam and hot water
all by itself but it can also be used in
other areas away from its origin listen
to fris Juber director of a plant in
France’s overseas guadaloop region which
hopes to supply 20% of the Island’s
electricity through geothermal energy by
2035
for Advocates say this renewable source
has the potential to increase energy
Security in an uncertain world after the
1970s Oil Embargo spurred an energy
crisis across the world Iceland
harnessed its abundant geothermal
resources for heat and electricity today
the country receives more than 90% of
its heat from geothermal energy experts
say the resource has the potential to
slash High emitting Nations dependence
on dirty fossil fuels Indonesia for one
has closed to 40% of the world’s
geothermal potential while untapped
resources in the United States could
Supply 10% of today’s energy needs for
countries with little to no natural
resources geothermal energy could reduce
Reliance on imported fuels it is an
energy source that could be utilized
more and better but it’s it’s not a
completely renewable source and it’s not
without its problems I think that’s
important to remember but it’s overall
better than coal and gas in
environmental groups say Solutions must
be found for the harmful drilling stage
which can lead to sulfur pollution and
CO2 emissions using geothermal for
electricity however produces only
about6 of the CO2 of a natural gas power
plant and emits 13 times less greenhouse
gases but the reason geothermal energy
hasn’t been used as widely stems from
one crucial Factor the high upfront cost
during the initial exploration stage age
and the risk of not being
[Music]
successful according to the World Bank
initial exploration and test drill for 3
to five geothermal plants cost anywhere
between 20 to $30 million and for an
average sized home installation of heat
pumps cost between1 to
$20,000 a global effort to exploit the
potential of geothermal energy would
therefore demand a major mobilization of
private sector Investments experts say
this must include risk mitigation
mechanisms and funding from public
sources climate finance and guarantees
center of the earth is is extremely hot
um due to long standing radioactivity
and um the the pressure of of gravity
pushing on the center of the earth so
it’s it’s
effectively an unlimited source of
energy and how is this um uh connected
to the magma that flows within the
Earth’s
crust well this the heat is creating the
the molten rock the Magna uh the magma
which comes out when we have volcanoes
um so everything below a certain depth
is effectively um molten and and it it
normally stays there unless there’s a
crack in in in the surface that allows
it to come up closer to to where we
are um what’s your best argument
Jonathan in fever of jeal energy as a
renewable
source I think um
when we look at the range of renewable
options that we
have um they tend to all have their own
disadvantages and the the ones that we
use most commonly um like solar and wind
are intermittent so when it’s windy um
I’m here I’m here in the UK it’s a very
windy country we have um a lot of wind
potential but sometimes there’s no wind
um and then the the wind turbines don’t
produce anything you know if you’re in
Turkey maybe solar is better than it is
in the UK but it’s there’s no solar at
night um and even in Sunny countries you
get days that are overcast and there’s
no um generation from solar the beauty
of geothermal is that it can be Basel
loaded so the heat is there all the time
you can run it 24 hours a day 365 days a
year um at whatever um load capacity you
need you know given the demand at that
particular time so it’s much more um
reliable than some of the other more
common um renewable energy
sources these geothermal sources cool
down over
time um over geological time yes um but
they’re not going to cool down because
we’re using them um the the amount of
heat there is is um so vast we can’t com
size of it and it’s not going to be used
up because we’re producing electricity
from
it um during human extraction understand
their environmental concerns about the
release of greenhouse gas emissions like
hydrogen sulfide carbon dioxide methane
um are these emissions you think
significant when compared to oil and
gas well there are there are
environmental issues around um J thermal
and I think the emissions of of gases
are probably less of an issue generally
the number one environmental concern
around geothermal usage is actually the
water so in a traditional geothermal um
Power Generation you have a hot spring
and up comes the water and then you have
to dispose of the water and the water
May well have um contaminants it may
well have water even though it’s super
heated it’s
unusable um well it’s super heated you
it it comes up you you use it to to heat
turbines and produce electricity and
then you have to get rid of that water
somehow um and water that comes up from
the ground has minerals in it and
sometimes those minerals are are are
ones that we don’t want to uh have to
deal with so um disposing of that water
is traditionally being the biggest
environmental concern when it comes to
geothermal
what’s preventing everyone from
installing a geothermal system say at
their
homes it’s it’s basically cost um so to
have a an effective geothermal system
that produces Heat at a high enough
temperature to say produce electricity
means you have to drill extremely deep
um into the ground deeper than we we
generally do for um oil and gas and so
the uh and once you’ve drilled a hole
that deep once you’ve drilled a well
that deep the capital cost of that well
means that you need to produce a lot of
energy to to pay that back um also the
the level of geothermal potential varies
from different places so we all know
about Iceland Iceland you know it’s
active volcano area they have lots of
very hot hot springs and for them
Drilling in into the Earth and and
producing geothermal energy is
relatively cheap but there’s lots of
places in the world where the the active
hot rock that you need is much further
below the ground um so with the current
geothermal that we use there’s only
certain areas where um this technology
can be used that’s not necessarily going
to stay the same there’s developments
going on that may make this a much more
widespread source of energy but that’s
traditionally been the way it has been
yes just about to ask you if you think
the costs are worth it um compared to
the devastation and destruction and harm
that other Duty forms of energy um cost
us on a human level on an environment
level ecosystem level is the cost worth
it should we invest these billions or
trillions of dollars um to um install
these systems in a way that everyone has
assets I think one of the difficulties
with investing in in in these
Technologies is that um if we take solar
for examp as an example if you look at
how much it cost a panel cost say 20
years ago compared to how much it costs
today um spending that money in a panic
20 years ago would have got us a lot
less clean energy than spending the same
money today um so that there has to be a
balance between you know it it has to be
cost effective and in in the sense of um
when we look at geothermal there’s a
number of companies that have some very
interesting new
technologies and and we see lots of
these Technologies they never work in
commercial uh we we read about lots of
wonderful new green technologies they
don’t commercial successes but if we
assume that some of these Technologies
May well U make big breakthroughs then
perhaps 10 years from now now we’ll have
much cheaper ways of of producing
geothermal energy than we do today
that’s not an argument to say we don’t
do
anything um that we don’t use the good
resources that we have the most
cost-effective resources that we have
now but it is an argument to say that we
don’t necessarily need to um spend vast
sums of money in a in a panic on
technology that might actually be
outdated um just a few years down the
road to uh to give an example of one
company that I I I know of it’s a
Canadian company called
Evo and they’ve developed a closed loop
um geothermal system where effectively
they have wells drilled down um at
either end and the water flows down
along a grid underneath the ground heats
up comes up the other end goes through a
heating system and then they use the
same water and it goes back down again
so you don’t have the um the water waste
problem um and you don’t even have to
have pumps because everything works on
on on heat convection you know heat
rises and it pulls the colder water back
down the other side um and there’s some
interesting projects in Germany and in
Austria using this technology at the
moment um
and one of the uh you remember I said I
was talking about drilling deep enough
to get water that’s hot enough to create
steam to produce electricity
um they’re actually focusing at the
moment on Central Heating plants so in
lots of places in Europe they have these
central heating plants and hot water is
piped to the homes and traditionally
they’ve been coal or gas um some of them
are changing to biofuels but if they can
use geothermal in this instead of fossil
fuels
um immediately you wipe out the carbon
emissions for the heating of the homes
in the region where this this thing
exists and it’s much easier to get 70
degree 80
degree um water than it is to get 200
300 degree you don’t have to drill so so
deep um so they’re kind of looking at
lwh hanging fruit that’s cheaper to do
um and at the moment it’s just a few
projects to see whether it really works
and whe they can get the the economics
working
um Jonathan um weathers at some future
time um decades multiple DEC decades
centuries from now yes or no answer can
geothermal energy save us I think so I
think so it’s um it’s continuous base
load um it’s completely green it it
basically has um unlimited potential it
can go on for centuries um it it’s not
going to run out um so I I think from a
from a heating electricity point of view
if we can get the costs to work um it
could become the the default form of
energy but it’s always if we can get the
cost to
work in a first for climate Justice a
European court has ruled that EU member
states must protect their citizens from
the dangers of climate change the court
condemned the Swiss government for
violating elderly women’s human rights
by failing to meet its own climate goals
and establish a common budget the
organization called senior women for
climate protection represents over 2500
women who are mostly in their 70s
lawyers argued age and gender makes them
more at risk uh to the effects of heat
waves observers believe the case would
could have an impact across Europe and
Beyond Dr St this is an amazing um
victory for your group CLA soran uh for
your First Reactions how do you
feel oh God right now I feel incredibly
tired I haven’t had enough sleep I gave
about a 100
interviews and despite all this I feel
absolutely great when you wait for
something for 8 years and then you get a
yes you actually won it’s like Christmas
and Easter and New Year’s and whatever
you celebrate all together in
one yeah so it does feel great let’s go
back to the beginning based on what your
lawyers argued that age and gender makes
people over a certain age more at risk
of heat waves it kind of suggests that
there was something that pre
precipitated uh everything that took
place an individual event maybe that
started the spite for climate Justice I
I keep imagining someone from your group
uh suffering a heat stroke exactly how
did all this start so how did all this
start if you know it actually started
with a young man
it started yes it started with a young
man who worked as a environmental
scientist at Green Peace and he heard
about this case in the Netherlands this
urenda case I don’t know whether you
heard of that and urgenda was a group of
people and they took their government to
court for an inadequate climate policy
and they won so the state of the
Netherlands had to improve their um
climate
policy and then this young men who
worked at Green pece thought that’s what
we want to do but how can we do it in
Switzerland you can only do it when you
are personally affected who is affected
the most out of all the PO the segments
of population elderly women and that’s
then why he contacted an elderly women’s
Association and I said would you take
this on and they did and out of a
thousand there were about 150 when the
association was founded and now we are
two and a half
thousand oh fantastic well you guys came
together built a case that basically
said the Swiss government had violated
its citizens human rights by not doing
enough to fight climate change the court
agreed but what exactly does that mean
is Switzerland way behind on its targets
yes Switzerland is extremely behind on
its targets like most countries give me
a country that is not behind its
Target uh it’s behind its Target and
specifically it’s
not the track we are on together with
several other countries we are way above
the
1.5 that we should not get over
according to the Paris agreement which
our country has signed many other
countries have signed
so that is a fact we are not online
because the track we are on is more on
three degrees global warming now
worldwide on the average we already have
1.2 and we see the damage that is being
done I think so we definitely have to be
Beyond 1.5 which we are not plus we do
not have a real budget in terms of how
many emissions are we still allowed to
let out into the into the air we don’t
know that what many people here in
Switzerland says oh come on we such a
small country forget it you know we
contribute only 0 point I don’t know 0
four% to the worldwide gas emissions but
that’s unfair you know every single
country and there are many small
countries in this world if they would
all say the same then that would in
itself add up to
40% of global misss so we have to do our
share that’s only fair and we are not
because we do not know how much is it
exactly that would be the first thing
that practically the government would
have to
do on that note I’d love to get your
comment your reaction to certain
criticism so the court said uh that
ordered Switzerland to address its uh
climate shortcomings and pay your group
80,000 so but what do you say to people
who argue um that Switzerland should not
have to pay uh for warming temperatures
which of course it’s a global issue and
not caused solely by the Swiss
government no of course it’s not caused
solely by the Swiss government that’s
what everybody every country says that
you know they look at their
own it’s like I would say you know the
amount of taxes I pay to the state is so
many skill I’m not going to pay it okay
okay I mean that’s not fair right
because many people have only a a little
budget that they or a little amount of
money they have to pay to the state so
when people say they should not pay
80,000 what do they pay that for it’s
not for us it’s not because we we were
we didn’t ask for any money zero so it’s
not for
damages it is actually for some of the
cost okay and now yes Switzerland is
near is I mean 80,000 in this whole game
of cleaning up the air and cleaning up
the planet is again a minuscule amount
the court considers it clear that future
Generations are likely to Bear an
increasingly severe burden of the
consequences of present failures and
omissions to combat climate change the
court holds that the special features of
of climate change as a common concern of
humankind and the need to promote
intergenerational burden sharing renders
it appropriate to make allowance for
recourse to legal action by associations
in the context of climate change it was
worthwhile fighting because now we have
880,000
Swiss Franks or Euros no that’s not it
and if we are on this line I first of
all yes we were we were fighting for
ourselves we said uh during heat waves
our health is high at risk the highest
of all the population
segments but we know I mean I’m now
76 and now I know my daughter doesn’t
like me to say this but statistically
speaking in 10 years I’m gone so it’s
not I and my generation that profits
from what we gained today the Next
Generation and that’s very important for
us it is it
is wow that that those statements uh
gives me a lot more perspective in terms
of why you’re fighting for this um so
the Court’s decision is legally binding
but do you think the Swiss government
will
comply well they have to because we are
a member of the European Council you
know this whole thing has nothing to do
with the European Union what some people
still confuse
so we are an official member state of
the Council of Europe now the court that
belongs to the Council of Europe is the
European Court of human rights in
Strasburg many people confus that also
with Brussels and then the EU again so
the government better accept it and they
have made a first statement and they
said yes we will honor this statement we
will live up to
it and I love to hear that but we all
know how
much how many words are spent out into
and they fly somewhere around but they
don’t go where they actually should so
we make sure that they
keep that they increase the speed of
coming up with a climate policy that
really deserves its name and
protects the population from
these terrible and increasing heat waves
and we are not going back to the rocking
chair I can tell you that we will watch
out that the government does its job we
don’t know exactly how we can oversee
that because first of all it’s the job
of the the Ministers of the European
Union so there will be one or two I
don’t know how many person be assigned
and S
now has to give evidence of what they
are doing at the beginning now four
times a year that’s a lot and we will we
will definitely look at
that necessar speed up the heat you know
we all have to give a little bit of a
kick in the behind of these slow acting
governments and
Poli got it do

Geothermal is heating up in the US state of Texas, also known as the HQ for major oil companies. Does the green technology have a chance? And drought has forced Colombia’s capital to ration water. Elsewhere, whales get legal person hood, in order to protect their rights.

Subscribe:
http://trt.world/subscribe
Livestream: http://trt.world/ytlive
Facebook: http://trt.world/facebook
Twitter: http://trt.world/twitter
Instagram: http://trt.world/instagram
Visit our website: http://trt.world