Week 3

Welcome to week 3 of my blog! This week I tackled geothermal energy, what it is, how it’s harnessed, the pros, and the cons! Prior to this week I had no concrete understanding of how geothermal energy actually worked and to my surprise geothermal power plants extract energy from geothermal reservoirs found underground! These geothermal reservoirs carry water and steam which are sent through a separation process in which they will both, through different processes, be used to produce energy. Places like Iceland, that naturally have this phenomena, can use the heated water to heat residences. Otherwise, for traditional geothermal energy production, the water will flow up to earth’s surface and travel from a high to low-pressure tank, producing steam which passes through a turbine, rotating the blades and activating the generator.

I also met with my on-site advisor over zoom and have scheduled to attend an undergraduate lecture on the hydrogen economy next wednesday! He also offered to give me a tour of the lab he and his PhD students work at. I can’t wait ~

Next week I will begin looking into US energy sources, such as the efforts the US has taken to move away from unsustainable, non-eco-friendly sources of energy and attempts to seek out cleaner, more sustainable options.