Here in Iceland, the geothermal power plant behind me uses renewable energy. It uses water and heat from the ground. Iceland doesn’t have to worry about “using it up”. It’s renewable!
Iceland uses heat from under the ground to create energy.
Look at the geothermal power plant in the video below. It’s very large. Many pipes of hot water lead to it, so it can use the hot water’s steam to generate electricity. (Sorry about all the noise in the video. That’s the wind blowing through the microphone. The geothermal plant is very quiet.)
This pod covers a drill that goes deep into the ground. It’s pulling out hot water to send to the power plant down the hill.
The geothermal plants don’t need to burn air-polluting coal to create electricity. Instead, they create steam by heating up water.
Holes are drilled into the ground until they reach the hot water that naturally flows underground in Iceland. Click on the picture to read about the process: hot water’s steam to electricity.
The steam from the hot water has lots of pressure to push large turbines around and around. As the turbines move, they create electricity.
This is a sample turbine. The pressure of hot water’s steam pushes it around. As it rotates, it generates electricity.
This video shows a working model of the hot water and steam as it travels from the drill site on the left, past the turbines, and out of the plant as electricity on the right.
Inside the geothermal plant, I saw lots of machinery. The workers harness the hot water’s steam by sending it through large pipes and past a turbine, so it will turn and generate electricity. The electricity then travels out through electric wires.
The electricity made by the geothermal plant is sent through wires to homes and businesses throughout Iceland.
This line graph shows the large amounts of poisonous carbon dioxide that used to be produced by Iceland’s power plants when they burned coal to generate electricity. When Iceland began using geothermal power in the 1970’s, much less carbon dioxide went into the air.
Iceland’s power plants create very little air pollution when they generate electricity, unlike most American power plants that generate lots of air pollution when they burn coal to make electricity. This also makes Iceland’s electricity very cheap. People who live there spend very little money on electricity, so they have more money for the fun things in life. 🙂
Taking a rest on some cooled lava. Behind the geothermal station you see in the distance is a nice warm pool of water the power station no longer needs. Chirpy says, “Let’s go see the big bird bath!”
Near one of the power stations, the hot water that’s been used to create electricity is piped to a large outdoor pool before it continues on its way to the ocean. It’s become a tourist attraction for Icelandic people, as well as people visiting Iceland from around the world. I can tell you from first-hand experience, that no matter the weather, this water is always nice and warm. 🙂
The water is warm and lovely. There’s a swim-up bar on the far side of the island. “A Blueberry Smoothie please!”
The “Blue Lagoon” has water flowing into it and out of it at all times. The water was used by the power station to make steam. Can you see the power station in the background, under the rainbow?
i am very very happy iceland isnt polluting anymore it breaks my heart to know that people dont care about the earth but it melts my heart that the people who care are acually taking action. I hate pollution our world was beautiful until people started not caring and trashing it.
Geothermal power is a very good idea! I would never have thought about that. I would never have thought that people could slow down CO2 a lot.
its so cool that people came up with using the magma underground to create energy
I think it it really cool that we can create energy without burning fossil fuels! I think if every country could do this, the co2 levels would go down.
I hope they find a way to this in other countries
I think it’s really cool that they have a pool that people can go in! Also I never knew that it doesn’t get dark until later. I find it very interesting.
Awesome pictures.It’s nice to see other people using other ways to make electricity.Are they slowing down climate change with these knew methods? It’ nice to see other people around the world using solar panels to slow climate change.
It’s so cool that the pool there generates electricity and serves as a amazing tourist destination. I wonder if we could make one in the U.S.A.
I think that the way that you can harness energy from the earth is cool. There also many other ways to harness energy from the environment. There are windmills and you can even harness energy from waterfalls. You can even get solar panels for your house. I have solar panels on my house. My mom said that it’s been saving her money, so it’s like win – win.
I never knew that hot water leads to the plant so it can power energy. Now i know that Geothermal power plants pollute less than regular power plants.
Wow. I see all the steam coming out, and I can’t believe it isn’t harmful to the enviroment! I didn’t think that was possible!
The geothermal power is a very great idea. It takes the earths heat and makes electricity out of it.We should start doing similar things in countries around the world.This would do a lot to slow down climate change. I hope that people continue to come up with ideas like this.
That’s so cool that Iceland uses hot water to generate electricity from underground. I hope we can use hot water to generate electricity from underground instead of burning fosil fules to generate electricity.
🙂
I learned that geothermal plants do not produce air pollution. That is good because that means we do not have to worry so much about global warming if we do not burn as many fossil fuels.
We should use more geothermal power in the US because they help the environment, make less carbon dioxide and they are cheaper to run. With means more money to go around.
If places all around the Earth did this, global warming would slow down a lot. Why can’t countries do more of this?
Iceland is very smart to use this method of creating electricity. By using this green method, you can create electricity without burning fossil fuels. This means less carbon dioxide will get into the air causing less global warming! This would be a great addition to america seeing how many power plants, and factories we have.
I think that the plant is smart because it uses heat.It didn’t burn fossil fuels.I think it is pretty great.
I think the goverment of Iceland is very smart. Instead of burning fossil fuels he uses natural resourses! How brilliant is that!
I had no idea that Iceland uses heat from under the ground to create it’s energy!
It is very cool that in Iceland they use steam insed of burning fossile fules.
I learned that the geothermal plants do not need to burn air polluting coal to create electricity. I also learned that Iceland’s power plant creates very little air pollution.
Iceland was really smart to think of using hot water to create electricity. Now there will be less carbon dioxide in the air and they won’t have to worry about running out of coal anytime soon. Now Iceland’s citizens will save money and can do more fun things with the money they saved.
That’s really cool that Iceland’s power plants uses very little air poultion I hope that some day America’s power plants can use less air poultion.
🙂
that’s really bad that so much pollution goes in the air
There are so many ways to make power naturally with little or no carbon dioxide output. If humans had thought about things like hydroelectric power and geothermal power 40 or 50 years a go perhaps climate change wouldn’t be such a big problem now. Geothermal power runs without emitting any carbon dioxide. Since it uses naturally boiled water from the earth to create electricity. Or hydroelectric power witch also releases no carbon dioxide into the air because it uses flowing water to create electricity.
Wow! I had no idea that people in iceland make electricity from hot water underground. In some ways it is a lot like hydropower but it is very different otherwise. Both use turbines to create the electricity, but on use hot water the other one doesn’t. It is just so amazing how we are figuring out ways to create power without putting too much pollution into the air.