Geothermal energy
Let me make it clear from the outset – I am not a geologist. But if you have not noticed, we live on a planet whose core, it is estimated by said geologists, is between 4000°C and 7000°C, or for simple comparison, about the same temperature as the surface of the sun. Mining engineers and mineworkers get some inkling of this when they make their way underground. Millions of Rand are spent in cooling the production areas of mines because rock temperatures at 3 km underground are around 55°C and as mine depths approach 5 km underground they rise to about 70°C.
There is far more energy stored deep below us than we could conceivably use before our planet is obliterated by a passing piece of space debris or errant meteor. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, the amount of heat within 10 000 metres of Earth’s surface contains 50 000 times more energy than all the oil and natural gas resources in the world.
The geothermal bounties of the Rift Valley are used to good effect in Kenya, where the German-supported 70 MW Olkaria II power station, Africa’s biggest geothermal power station, was inaugurated in 2004.
Of course, ground conditions have to be right to establish a geothermal power plant, but such conditions are believed to exist in some of the mountainous areas of the Cape and in the Rift Valley in Zambia to which we are linked via the Southern African Power Pool grid.
South Africa has some of the finest mining engineers in the world, so I have to ask, “Have we seriously considered how we might use this untapped source of energy?”
Keeping out of hot water
In the introduction to last month’s scada reviews, I commented that users add unnecessary risk to their operations if they fail to look after their plant systems and valuable data.
Cyber security is an important part of asset protection which is not being taken sufficiently seriously by many system installers and end-users.
The drive for higher productivity and more realtime data at higher levels within manufacturing organisations and public utilities has inevitably led to more and more plant control networks being connected to business networks and ultimately, the world. Control systems are then exposed to the possibilities of malicious attacks or potentially catastrophic failure as a result of inadvertent infection from computer viruses. Where the compromised systems control pipelines, petrochemical and fuel storage facilities, power distribution grids and the like, the impact of these events can be disastrous in terms of their economic impact, environmental damage, risk to human life and plant downtime.
January 2006 saw the USA release of the Roadmap to Secure Control Systems in the Energy Sector, sponsored by the US Department of Energy and the US Department of Homeland Security. This study contained a structured set of priorities addressing specific control systems needs within the following ten years.
In the absence of such a comprehensive South African initiative we have published in this issue an article on cyber security written by Bob Huba of Emerson Process Management.
Andrew Ashton
Features editor: SA Instrumentation & Control
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