“There is a better way for everything. Find it.” ~ Thomas A. Edison
Colder than an evil witch’s heart, hoarfrost decorating the trees in thick layers of white frosting, the winter’s frigid grip harassed the towel-clad troup. The small family group made their way to the little shack through gentle gusts of wind-driven frost; smoke chugging from the chimney was pushed horizontal by the breeze. Icicles hung from the eaves, and firewood fronted either side of the door, ricked to waist height, ready for immediate use.
After entering the building, they hung their towels on the hooks in the changing room and entered the sauna. The air, warmed by the dull red glowing woodstove, was like walking into a thick, invisible blanket. It was hotter than a fox’s frock in a forest fire. Rocks in the catchment on the top of the stove were radiating intense heat, ready for the first pour of water.
Water, ladled from a wooden bucket and dumped, spitting and hissing on the field stones, released its liquid humidity. The tsunami of heat stormed into the dry skin of the bathers, adding tiny beads of sweat that quickly formed rivulets and then small streams of perspiration. The rapid increase in heat opened pores and cleansed the body, soothing the mind and seizing the adherents with its power.
The general rule is to stay in as long as you want, cool off, roll in the snow if you like and reenter as you prefer. The point is to relax, enjoy the bath, and de-stress, letting your anxieties depart with the hidrosis.
For Nordic people, especially the Finns, the sauna is a simple technology that keeps the body and soul scrubbed, inside and out. Finnish studies show numerous health advantages to a regular sauna regime. A ritual thousands of years old keeps the body clean; the cleanliness keeps disease at bay. Finland has 3 million saunas and 5.5 million residents.
Thermal heat has more applications than a mere sauna; Hero of Alexandria harnessed steam in the first century CE with his aeolipile. In 1698, Thomas Savery patented a pump using the power of condensing steam, and in 1712, Thomas Newcome developed a more efficient steam engine to be improved upon by James Watt in 1765. Steam power has been around for a long time.
Initially, steam-driven engines and then turbines were powered by energy-dense coal. In Alberta, coal has been phased out, and now Alberta has 50 operational power plants driven by natural gas, with two more planned and one more under construction. These generation stations range in size from 6 to 1360 MW.
In renewable energy generation, we have options like biomass, biogas, and waste heat recovery, with 16 projects, plus one being built and one planned. The standard Hydroelectric power: 22 dams. The ever-controversial Wind turbines: 49 wind farms, four under construction, and three more planned. The much-touted Photovoltaic array: 44, 12 more under construction, and 18 planned.
Alberta has battery banks for energy storage. There are ten lithium-ion storage plants and one more is planned. Notably, one flow battery storage facility is under construction; in this system, the electrolyte is charged outside the battery- more about this later. Pumped hydroelectric: two are planned, and a novel approach, Geomechanical pumped storage, where water is pumped into a hydrocarbon reservoir and then allowed to flow back to drive a turbine and generate electricity when needed, has one project planned.
While the listed projects require natural gas, wind, water, or sun, only Alberta’s natural gas and hydroelectric can fully support the base load requirements for minus 45 degrees weather, fogged-in, or windless conditions.
As of yet, underdeveloped geothermal energy could assist baseload requirements. The heat from the earth at depth has enough power to drive Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) turbines. Excess heat can be utilized for thermal applications such as homes, greenhouses, or even streets. Iceland is a leader in these technologies, but Alberta is starting to wake up.
In the geothermal energy category, one project with thermal heat and electrical production is in the planning stage. Alberta has enormous opportunities in this area. According to CanGea, the Canadian Geothermal Energy Association, the province has a theoretical potential of 8,176,000 MW. We have a technical generation capacity listed by depth at a 20% recovery rate of 555,800 MW.
Razor Energy and FutEra Power have teamed up to use Razor’s Swan Hills enhanced oil recovery operation to harness a hybrid 21 MW hydrothermal heat coupled with waste heat recovery from Razor Energy’s processing plant. It is the first in the province and went into operation in March 2023.
Terrapin Geothermics, an Edmonton, Alberta-based company, has a geothermal project called “Alberta No. 1.” It is expected to generate 10 MW of baseload power and 985 TJ/year of baseload heat. Located in the Municipal District of Greenview, it is slated to be the first fully geothermal plant in operation in the province.
The first demonstration facility for geothermal production went into operation in 2019 to prove their concept and log data. Eavor’s project, The Derek Riddell Eavor-Lite™ Demonstration Facility, uses two horizontal wells intersected at 2400 meters of depth and connected by a surface pipeline. The purpose is to demonstrate their technology’s operational stability and capability in the most cost-effective method possible.
Novus Earth, a Calgary, Alberta-based company, is developing a geothermal project near Hinton, Alberta. The Latitude 53 Project has plans which include a 3.1 MW power plant driven by 130 Celsius heat from a 4 km deep closed-loop system. The excess heat will be transported into the town for a district heating and cooling system with thermal support for hydroponic and aquaculture facilities.
Geothermal has tremendous potential, as do the innovators and thinkers in our province. As our hydrocarbons deplete, we are preparing and working on technologies that will maintain our standard of living, which we have become so accustomed to that it now seems most take it for granted. Advances in Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) turbines enable energy to be harvested from temperatures as low as 80 degrees Celsius. This makes geothermal far more accessible. The World’s poor and disadvantaged could and hopefully will eventually benefit from our experiments as innovation becomes infrastructure.