In August 2017, amid a seismic swarm in Yellowstone that began in the summer and the consequent widespread concern, NASA made the world even more worried: several figures from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration went to the press and announced their plans slightly chill”Yellowstone.
NASA's idea was to pump large quantities of water into the caldera, which would not only help the geysers cool the supervolcano, but also generate cheap electricity for the Kiowa wigwams.
Volcanologists around the world who read this news took the NASA project as a kind of stupid joke designed to promote a little organization that eats a lot of money from the budget, and brings little benefit to the image of the United States as a space power.
Technically, the idea of creating a geothermal power plant on a volcano is a good and correct idea, but a volcano is not a volcano. Therefore, only astronauts could offer to pump water into Yellowstone to cool it, thus creating a grandiose steam catapult capable of throwing a piece of Wyoming somewhere on the moon. Perhaps even one of Jupiter's moons.
However, after a year, it suddenly became clear that all this was not a joke and NASA is really moving on to saving the world, as reported not only by news resources like Zerohedge, but also by alarmed religious Breaking Israel News, who have consulted geologists from Orthodox Jews. In other words, even the rabbis were scared and stunned by NASA's crazy plans.
Zerohedge, Oct. 8, Yellowstone: “NASA moves to 'save' the world: NASA intends to pump massive amounts of water into the supervolcano's caldera to cool the magma chamber. For this purpose, it is planned to drill several wells in the caldera up to 10 kilometers deep.
Brian Wilcox of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory says that if "ten-kilometer wells were drilled and high-pressure water pumped in, the water could remove excess heat."
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The total project cost is estimated at US $ 3.46 billion and is an excellent investment opportunity as Yellowstone is currently wasting about 6 gigawatts of heat. But if turned into a geothermal facility, the supervolcano will supply energy to the market at a price of 10 cents per kilowatt / hour.”
Breaking Israel News, Oct. 8: Can NASA Cool Yellowstone's Flames: “NASA scientists have concluded that the most logical solution to the supervolcano problem would be to simply cool the magma while it is still underground. The solution is similar to the cooling of industrial power plants. The USGS estimates Yellowstone generates heat equivalent to six industrial power plants.
The caldera currently releases about 60 percent of its heat into the atmosphere through the hot spring system, but the rest goes to heating the rock in the walls of the magma chamber. This generates a lot of volcanic gases, which will eventually lead to an explosion one day.
However, NASA scientists believe that if you increase the percentage of heat transfer from the magma chamber, then Yellowstone will no longer pose a threat. Nevertheless, NASA understands that this is all very risky. Brian Wilcox of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory says “the most important thing about this is not to harm. If you drill through the dome of the magma chamber, it will become more fragile. Plus, the possibility of volcanic gas emissions will be added to this.
The plan also seems to us (Breaking Israel News) to be extremely bold, perhaps excessively bold. So Breaking Israel News asked Nathan Avizer, a professor of physics at Bar Ilan University, who is not only a scientist, but also a devout Jew, on this matter.
“If a scientist does not have the pride and scientific courage to go against the opinion of the whole world - then he is not a great scientist, with such an approach nothing new will never be discovered. Modesty is essential in real life, but shouldn't be part of the scientific process. The possibility of blowing off half of the world shouldn't bother a true scientist,”Professor Avizer said in an interview with Breaking Israel News.
What else did Professor Nathan tell the stunned rabbis about Breaking Israel News, so we will tell you further.
Let's start with the fact that the Yellowstone hydrothermal system has decided to live for a long time and already this summer has gone into ravage. Water has boiled away in the geysers, heat exchange (and geysers take, as noted above, about 60% of the heat) is disturbed and the supervolcano is preparing for a hydrothermal explosion. Moreover, USGS has already begun to gradually prepare the public for such an opportunity. What can be done in this dramatic situation?
Now, regardless of whether hydrothermal wells are drilled in the caldera or not, there will be a hydrothermal (or volcanic) explosion in any case. Once there is less water, it means more heat began to go into the rock, which means that the concentration of melt in the magma will sooner or later exceed the critical 50%, after which the eruption will begin. In this case, it would be quite logical to try NASA's risky project. If it works, heat exchange will be restored, if it does not work, there will be an explosion.
However, even in the event of an explosion, the situation can be tried to be directed according to the least destructive scenario, causing a small eruption in Yellowstone, passing on the Hawaiian type. That is, so that the magma just flows out of the chamber without tectonic explosions. There is a certain suspicion that something similar was done this spring in Hawaii.
This summer, one of the independent American geologists, Mr. Paul Collin, published a large study concerning the so-called "geothermal station" in Hawaii. He approached the question meticulously and raised a lot of scientific articles about Hawaii for a period of 50 years. The general conclusion of the study is that the Kilauea eruption, which took place in the spring and summer of 2018, was, knowingly or not, initiated by the drilling of geothermal wells.
Mr. Paul Collin believes that the eruption was accidental because drilling disrupted the established system of magma chambers, however, randomness in this situation is debatable. If in Hawaii we are talking about a sharp displacement of the mantle plume, which many American geologists suspect, then this displacement should lead to a giant underwater explosion with the destruction of the southeastern part of the Big Island, a tsunami and other delights.
Since in the USGS, not stupid people are involved in Hawaii and are actively watching everything there, there is a suspicion that these people chose the lesser of two evils: instead of waiting for an underwater explosion, they drilled wells along the eastern rift zone, poured some chemicals into it, perhaps even something- it was deliberately blown up at depth, thereby generating the eruption of the Kilauea volcano. After that, magma flowed out of numerous fissures for three months, which, if not for Kilauea, would still have fired - but a little later and immediately. In other words, at the cost of certain losses, the destruction of the Big Island was slightly delayed.
Hence, there is a certain suspicion that the USGS wants to do something similar with the Yellowstone volcano. That is, invite some guys from NASA, who will drill everything there. And if the magma chamber cannot be cooled, it, like in the spring in Hawaii, will simply be blown up stupidly by launching a six-month series on Twitter and Facebook on the topic “what will happen after this”.
Unfortunately, the exact date of the start of NASA's work has not yet been reported, but observing the seismographs of the caldera, we will not miss this epoch-making moment. As soon as the seismograms show signs of drilling machines operation, we will immediately see all this. So, we stock up on chips, warm clothes (if NASA fails, we are promised a volcanic winter) and - follow the development of events.