Northwest may harness volcanoes' energy
Deep beneath the Cascade Mountains -- where molten magma heats the Earth's crust, occasionally bursting forth in violent volcanic eruptions -- lurks an energy source scientists increasingly suspect might be tamed.
Though there has been little exploration and no deep test holes drilled to date, the geothermal potential of the Cascades, which run from Washington through Oregon into Northern California, is starting to attract a buzz. Some predict that in the next 10 or 15 years commercial-size power plants could be generating electricity.
"As this area is predicted to contain vast geothermal resources, development plans for the Cascades are becoming an increasingly frequent topic of conversation," said a report late last year done for the Department of Energy.
The report said the Cascades contain "potentially significant" geothermal resources, but it cautioned that the effort to tap these resources -- including drilling miles down into volcanoes to tap "supercritical fluids" -- will not be easy.
Even so, the hunt is under way.
Near Baker Lake, southeast of Mount Baker, an Oregon company is waiting for Forest Service leases and considering a 100-megawatt geothermal plant that could provide enough electricity for 100,000 people.
Steven Munson, chief executive of Vulcan Power Co., said there is more than an 80 percent chance the plant will be built. The facility would be designed to blend into the landscape and the power it would produce would be cheaper than from a new natural gas-fired generating plant, he said.
"We are very serious about this," Munson said, adding several of the state's utilities, which he declined to name, have expressed interest in purchasing the power.
On the east slopes of the Cascades, Raser Technologies Inc. of Utah is focusing on 5,000 of acres of International Paper land in Yakima and Kittitas counties for possible development.
"There is a lot of geothermal in Washington state," said Richard Putnam, a Raser executive. "It's already happening. It's a matter of how much and when."
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Northwest may harness volcanoes' energy
