Geologists are not trying to get rich finding out if that much energy is there. We already know that. We know how much energy there is and where it is. That’s finished work. You can look on maps and see where the best sites are located.

We’re trying to solve some engineering problems of the best way to drill the holes. And the best way to frack once the holes are in. And how to predict/minimize fracking tremors.

Those are processes we’ve been developing for more than 100 years. Some of that technology will transfer to enhanced geothermal and the same sorts of hard work and clever thinking will be needed to get past the current hole size problem.

Let’s tell them that we are going to sue their pants off if it’s not there or if it’s not recoverable at anything resembling a reasonable cost, and we’ll see if they stay as affirmative as now.

Also what *you* seem to not have registered, is that so-called enhanced geothermal involves hydraulic fracking, and so has a lot more similarities with shale gas extraction than you’d ever believe.

You’d be surprised at the time, effort, hard science, ingenuity, the Saudi Arabians spend at something as apparently simple as just getting oil out of the ground.

And you just have no idea how big a number 100 GW actually is.

Power demands will be down as there would be no need for AC or refrigeration. ;o)

Install enough enhanced to cover winter, add some solar for summer AC/refrig.

A billion is small money. About $3 per person in the US. And I don’t think we’re 10-15 years away, but more like 1-5. There are multiple companies working on drill “bit” development. As soon as someone can figure out the bit problem the field is likely to take off. We’ll install away from urban areas while we determine if tremors is actually a problem.
We know that enhanced works. We’ve got a working plant in Europe. The problem is drilling larger diameter holes in hard rock. That’s an engineering problem, not a problem that needs “science” to figure out.

As best as I can tell the study say that for ~billion we can know in 10-15 years if this idea will pan out and if yes the costs. Hopefully it might be faster but that is what the study is claiming. Kind of like the Thuriom guys given the billion then in 10-15 years they can prove it and then “Be ready to start building them”. I think that we will see several “new” approaches enter the market in the next 15 years, look at the cost of wind 15 years ago. It isn’t the billion I’m worried about it is the 10-15 year wait to know and then get started.

While that helps us in 2050-2100 time frame. We need a big ramp now in the green power that can hit the ground this and next year! I think today that is conservation, solar, wind, any geoThernal site that work with current tech, small head hyro. Hopefully wave/ocean comes on line over the next 5 years. We can’t wait until 2027 (2012+15) to kick our fussel fuel addiction.

Heck I would be glad to see cold zero point energy come on line, but I don’t except to see it anytime soon; or in my life more than likely, And I don’t want to wait 15 years to find or prove something better than the green we already have. Lets be at 30-50% of todays total power production by 2027 and then we will have breathing space to make it to 2050.

PV was very expensive by today’s standards. Solyndra had a plan to get solar on flat rooftops at a better price than one could do with panels. It seemed to be a good idea by both energy and financial players. No one predicted that panel prices would take the immense and very rapid price drop that we saw happen after Solyndra was in the process of building a new plant so that they could crank out large amounts of product.

With the surge in the number of scientists in the early 1960s one would have probably found it quite reasonable to build a new plant to manufacture slide rules.

Then Texas Instruments released an affordable scientific calculator and the two major slide rule manufacturers shut down their factories in two years.

One can’t predict what is impossible to predict. When you get blindsided by a development that no one saw coming, that’s life.

We know the energy is there. That’s settled science.

Drilling the larger diameter holes needed for enhanced geothermal takes a different type bit than what is used for oil and natural gas. My guess is that someone smart will figure this problem out. What we’re looking for is something that drills larger than an oil well rig but smaller than a tunnel boring machine.

All the estimates are based on burning NG at 2010 rates. We are now building a lot more electricity plants which will burn NG, we’re switching some of our transportation to NG, and we’re getting ready to export NG.
It’s not inconceivable that we could soon double the 2010 burn rate. That would make the range of available NG 10 years to 50 years.

You might find this an interesting read…
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/future_tense/2011/12/is_there_really_100_years_worth_of_natural_gas_beneath_the_united_states_.html

Does the US have 100GW of geothermal potential? Well, geologists say we do, you say we don’t.

Hummmmmmmmmm……….. Who do I find more believable.

There is not 100 GW of geothermal resource available in the US, you are day dreaming.
In poster-boy Island, they actually have only 500 MW usable for electricity, all the rest is low temperature geothermal they use for heating.