What is Geothermal Energy?
Geothermal energy is the kind of energy being obtained from the heat of the earth. It doesn’t depend on the solar system. Keep in mind, the interior region of the earth below the crust is hot, consisting the molten rocks called as magma. Magma is actually into a semi solid state. The geological changes push up this semi-liquid magma towards the upper surface and it is being collected at some depth below the surface of the earth. Such places are known as the hot spots and considered as the source of the geothermal energy.
Whenever the underground water comes into contact of hot spots, it turns down into the stream, which is also trapped into the space between the rocks and compressed because of the high pressure. Such stream could be collected by simply introducing them after drilling up holes. These pipes reach up to the depth of the hot spots. The stream coming up all through the pipes could also be used for running the turbines.
At times, the stream could find its way all through the cracks into the crust coming up into the surface in the geysers form. The stream from geysers has the temperature of about 150-200ºC. The geothermal energy is somewhat an eco-friendly source of the energy and the cost of electricity generated from it is almost half of the electricity being generated nursing this conventional methods.
Advantages of Geothermal Energy
* Such energy could be used for about 24 hours all through the year
* The production cost is somewhat lower than what people think
* Eco-friendly
