By Wes Hamilton–Geothermal heating utilizes heat from the earth’s core for direct heating applications. While this may sound a little futuristic or even unrealistic, you might be surprised to find that there are currently over 70 countries world wide that utilize geothermal heating. This type of heating is excellent as there is no need to convert another energy form into heat as the energy is already in the form of heat.
Geothermal heat occurs from solar energy absorbed from the sun, the original formation of the earth and radioactive decay of minerals. The best place to have access to geothermal heat is by tectonic plate boundaries where there is a lot of volcanic activity. Typically the ground and water at these spots is higher then in the rest of the planet. However, no matter where you are, at hot spots or cold areas you can still extract geothermal heat using a geothermal heat pump.
Geothermal heat is mainly used for space heating and spas. However a small amount of it is also used for domestic hot water, agricultural applications, desalination and other industrial processes. Geothermal heating is very efficient on a large scale so space heating may be best applied to multiple buildings or even entire communities versus just heating one single house. District heating is currently used in Boise, Idaho, Klamath Falls, Oregon, and Reykjavik, Iceland. Full story
