Pecologix Political Ecology Blotter

The objective of this study is to demonstrate the feasibility of acquiring geothermal energy from existing abandoned oil and gas wells. The equations describing the heat exchange between fluid and rocks are developed, and parametric studies are conducted in order to specify the optimum values of the main parameters. Computational results indicate that the geothermal [...]

The thermal performance of a horizontal-coupled ground-source heat pump system has been assessed both experimentally and numerically in a UK climate. A numerical simulation of thermal behaviour of the horizontal-coupled heat exchanger for combinations of different ambient air temperatures, wind speeds, refrigerant temperature and soil thermal properties was studied using a validated 2D transient model. [...]

A detailed analysis of U.S. energy consumption was performed to determine the amount of primary energy consumed as a function of its utilization temperature from 0 to 260 °C. The study highlights the changes that have occurred in U.S. energy use since the 1970s and suggests how renewable energy could provide a large fraction of [...]

California based Simbol Materials says that it has begun producing ‘the world’s highest purity’ lithium carbonate for use in electrolytes for EV batteries and other energy storage applications. The company has opened a demonstration facility near the Salton Sea in Imperial Valley, California, that can extract lithium and other components of lithium ion batteries from [...]

Geothermal energy offers clean, renewable, reliable electric power with no need for grid-scale energy storage, yet its use has been constrained to the few locations worldwide with naturally high geothermal heat resources and groundwater availability. We present a novel approach with the potential to permit expansion of geothermal energy utilization: heat extraction from naturally porous, [...]

Since heating and cooling systems of buildings consume 30–50% of the global energy consumption, increased efficiency of such systems means a considerable reduction in energy consumption. Ground source heat pumps (GSHP) are likely to play a central role in achieving this goal due to their high energy efficient performance. The efficiency of GSHP depends on [...]

Underground mines are extremely capital intensive, but despite this investment the traditional view has been that they have little useful value after closure. There are, however, potential positive uses of closed mines, in particular the generation of renewable geothermal energy. After closure, many mines flood and the relatively stable temperature of this water can be [...]