Geothermal Power, the Canadian Potential J
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Document generated on 09/23/2021 11:11 p.m. Geoscience Canada Geothermal Power, The Canadian Potential J. G. Souther Volume 3, Number 1, February 1976 URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/geocan03_01art02 See table of contents Publisher(s) The Geological Association of Canada ISSN 0315-0941 (print) unknown (digital) Explore this journal Cite this article Souther, J. G. (1976). Geothermal Power, The Canadian Potential. Geoscience Canada, 3(1), 14–20. All rights reserved © The Geological Association of Canada, 1976 This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ through west-central British Columbia kilometre of depth but locally, where hot and southern Yukon. They correspond or molten rock has risen into the upper to well-defined belts of Ouaternary Crust as plutons or breached the sudace volcanoes including more than 100 In volcanic erupttons the thermal post-glacial eruptive centres. Within gradlent may be many times hlgherthan these broad thermal zones specific normal. Only these rare "hot spots" targets based on local heat flow where anomalously high temperatures anomalies and spring water exist at shallow enough depths to be geochemistry are closely associated reached by drilling can be classified as with those volcanic centres that have potentlal energy resources. But high produced rhyolite or dacite domes and temperature and shallow depth are only Geothermal pumice. One of these (Meager two 01 several criteria that must be met Mountain) was selected for more before heat can be extracted in Power, The detailed study, including the drilling of commercial quantities. The reservoir two 50m holes in 1974. Subsequently. rock must be permeableenoughtoallow Canadian this target was chosen as the focus of a adequate circulation of fluid andthe fluid Potential more detailed geothermal resource ttself must be relatively free of corrosive evaluation commissioned by the British salts. Columbia Hydro and Power Authority. Five types of geothermal reservoirs J. G Souther are commonly recognized: 1) molten Geological Survey 01 Canada lntroduclion rock. 2) hot dry rock. 3) dry steam, 4) hot 700 West Pender Street Ut~lizatlonof geothermal energy for water. 5) geopressured brine. Vancouver. B.C. generating electric~tyis not a new The feasibility of extracting energy concept. The first turbines to use natural from molten lava 1s in a very early stage Summary steam were put into operation in of lnvest~gation.Similarly, the hot dry The technology lo produce electricity Larderello, Italy in 1904 and the fteld 1s rockconcept which involvesthe art~fic~al from the natural heat of the earth was st111produc~ng. Today more than a dozen fractur~ngof hot impermeable rock developed more than 70 years ago yet nations have operating geothermal lollowed by in]ectton of water to produce today total world production is less than electric plants and world production is steam has yet to be demonstrated 1500 Megawatts. Slow growth of nearly 1500 Megawatts. The largest experlmentally. The power potent~al01 geothermal eleclrlc generating capaclty development. at the Geysers In Northern geopressured brines such as those of can be attr~butedpartly to the former Cal~tornta,has an installed capacity of the Gull Coast of the US. is enormous abundance of low-cost fossll fuel and, 550 Megawatts, enough to supply the but development has so far been more recently, to the disproportionate total needs of San Francisco. curtailed by failure to produce a allocation of tunds to nuclear research. The spectacular success of conversion machine capable 01 Most of the earth's heat is too diffuse geothermal power developments In the wlthstandlng the h~ghlycorrosive brines. ever to be recovered by man. Only those Un~tedStates, Italy, Japan. New Only two types of reservoirs, dry rare thermal anomalies where htgh Zealand. Mextco and Iceland has placed steam and hot water have been brought temperatures prevall wlthln reach 01 it among the elite group of "alternate into commerctal product~on.Dry steam drill~ngcan be exploited for power energy" sources that are expected to fields, as the name implies, produce product~on.Techniques for locating augment and eventually replace our superheated steam that can be fed htdden geothermal reservoirs are only diminishtng reserves of fossil fuel. The directly into conventional turbines Such now belng developed and there is an appeal 01 geothermal energy lies in its fields (Larderello. Italy: Geysers, U S.: urgent need lor new wells totest the apparent simplictty. Unlike nuclear and Matsukawa, Japan) are relatively validity of existing geological concepts reactors it does not require the efficient and the volume of condensate and prospecting methods. development 01 a new and sophisttcated from the turbines is small enough to be In 1972 the Department of Energy. technology and unlikecoal-liredthermal reinjected thus minimizing Mines and Resources began an plants and hydroelectric dams it environmental damage investtgat~onofthegeothermal resource presents little risk of environmental In hot water fields (Wairaket. N Z.; potentlal of western Canada, Initial work damage. Unfortunately, f~ndingand Cerro Prieto, Mexico; Namafjall, Iceland) included: 1) expansion 01 the regional harnessing geothermal power involves the pore fluid IS water at a temperature heat llow program.;!) comp~lat~onoldata much more tnan drilllng bllndly Into the below 11sbotllng polnt at the hydrostatic on the distr~bution,age and earth. pressure prevailing In the reservoir. petrochemistry of Quaternary The natural heat of the earth is When such water is brought to the volcanoes: 3) systematic sampling and produced by the decay of radioactive surface in a well. part of it flashes to chem~calanalysis of water from all elements in the crust and mantle and. steam and the temperature of thewater- known thermal sprlngs. like these rare elements. most steam mixture drops accord~nglyThe Integration of this new data with geothermal heat ts too diffuse to ever be Steam 1s separated and put through low existing geological and geophysical recovered and used by man. Over most pressure turb~nes.The hot water is information on the crustal structure of of the earth the temperature increases usually discarded and may pose a the Canadian Cordillera Indicates flve only a few degrees centigrade per dlsposal problem, not only because of broad thermal anomalies extending Geo~cienceCanada.Volume3. Number 1. February. 1976 15 the large amount ol waste heat but also fault (Wilson. 1965). Offsets on the The Pembertonvolcanic belt (Fig. 1 )is because of dissolved toxic salts. Fairweather Fault, an extension of the defined by a group of epizonal plutons Unlike petroleum reservoirs, which Queen Charlotte Fault Into Alaska, and two deeply eroded cauldron may persist in the earth for several indicate right lateral displacements of as Complexes. Mt. Silverthrone and geological epochs, geothermal much as 150 miles since mid-Eocene Franklin Glacier complexes (Ney. 1968) reservoirs have a relatively short "shelf tlme and strike slip movement of up to that lie along a NW trending belt life''. As soon as a thermal anomaly is 21 5 feet during a single event on July extending from near theU.S. border east introduced into the upper crust of the 10,1958 (Plafker. 1972).Where the of Vancouver to King Island on the BC earththe heat beginstoseepaway tothe coastline of North America turns west coast. Potassium-argon ages on four ol surface along temporarily high thermal into the curving arc of the Alaska these plutons range from 18 to 7.8 my. gradients. Thus the geological record Peninsula the northwesterly moving Or approximately the same age as the abounds with "fossil geothermal Pacific crust again impinges on the late Miocene Plateau lavas of central systems" that long ago lost their heat. continental margin and moves down a British Columbia. The plutons are Active systems are rare and transient subduction zone beneath central Alaska believed to be subvolcanic bodies phenomena confined almost entirely to and the Aleutian arc. The present associated with a Miocene volcanic regions of late Tertiary and Quaternary dynamic relationship between western lront that was active during early stages tectonism. Canada and the adjacent Pacific crust of subduction of Juan de Fuca plate. Potential for geothermal power does not appear to have changed With the notable exception of King development in Canada is confined to Significantly during the last 10 to 15 m.y. Island, all the plutons and eruptive rocks the Cotdillera. The shield and stable are calc-alkaline, mainly granodioritic platlorm of the continental interior have Vdunidty bodies and dacite ejecta, whereas the unilormly low thermal gradients and no Volcanic activity in western Canada coeval plateau lavas are uniformly evidence of young tectonic or igneous duringthepast 15 million years has been alkaline basalts, suggesting a paired activity. Similarly the Appalachian localized along five distinct linear belts relationship analogous to an arc, back- orogenic region of eastern Canada is (Fig. 1) that appear to be related to plate arc association.