Geothermal probes to begin in September 2007

In an attempt to provide more energy from renewable sources, Munich’s utility company, Stadtwerke München (SWM), will begin probing Munich’s underground structure. First explorations in the 1980s in the surrounding countryside led to the discovery of aquiferous limestone strata, the water temperature ranges from 30°C just under the surface to 130°C 4,000 meters under the Mangfall valley south of Munich. The SWM are erecting a plant in Sauerlach that will be finished in 2009 and is set out to provide enough electricity from thermal water to supply 26,000 households, decreasing the annual CO2 emission by 37,000 tons.

On six chosen routes large utility vehicles, accompanied by security vehicles, will send low range bass sound waves underground every 15 meters via sonar plates, each blast lasting 20 seconds. So-called geophones will record the echoes, this data will then be used to construct a 3D model of the bedrock.


Should this investigation render positive results the SWM plans to connect the underground reservoir directly to its existing heating system and electricity plants. Up to now the exact locations of the planned drilling stations have not been decided on but the SWM has secured drilling rights in Sendling.

source: Süddeutsche Zeitung e-paper 17 August 2007

Pullach, just south of Munich has done this. Made a mess of the streets when they were putting in the pipes, but probably worth it in the end.

Cool...I mean hot.
BTW, with this technology are we not cooling down Mother Earth?

Probably, but that will be just another problem for the next generation to deal with...

Why would they need security vehicles accompanying them?

Like with global warming, there is a debate about the impact factor and risks.

too bad for them ahahahah!
(If reincarnation exists i'm fucked...)

what are the risks of this technology eurovol?

To stop the chavs stealing the soundsystem and putting it in their own cars? They would do anything for a "low range bass sound waves" stereo innit.

Because they are big and stationary and stop every 15 meters.
"Unimog-ähnlich" - gratuitous picture of an Unimog:

P.S. I like Tom's answer better.

Some claim that it could increase seismic activity by creating differentials in pressure, temperature and there is something else that escapes me at the moment. For an analogy, think of a pot of boiling oil. Now try pouring a cup of cold water into the oil (don't actually do this just think about it!). Alternatively, think of a pot of cold water and try pouring a cup of boiling oil into it (ok, this you can try if you really want to). This is the boiled down version of the conflicting ideologies (yes it is more complicated than that, but people can understand this).

Has anyone ever seen a demonstration of the cold water in the hot oil trick? Pretty cool huh? I am sure there is a youtube video of it somewhere.

I would really rather not think of the hot oil and water trick.
The Süddeutsche Zeitung did mention the risk of seismic activity. Due to the porous limestone structure it would not be necessary to blast huge holes in Mother Earth to create cavaties for the water to flow into like they did in the granite around Basel, resulting in a 3.4 earthquake on the Richter scale.

Very dangerous, but cool to watch.

Oil and water don't mix.

I don't even agree with the damp cloth over the pan. Flour does the trick - suffocate the flames, withdraw the oxygen. That's what I was taught as soon as I started cooking as a kid.

Not to get too far off thread, but flour can be explosive too. Have you ever seen a silo blow? It is salt that you want to use if you had no other choice.

Anyway, this is what some speculate could and probably does happen underground along with a myriad of other things associated with tapping into our "pot of hot oil".

Could flour be at all similar to the exploding custard powder trick that our chemistry teacher used to do? i.e. if chance would have it and you threw flour over it and the suspension of flour/air was just right, then it would explode? I don't know, I am just wondering.

I think I would stick with the damp teacloth. Can also be used to prevent seismic activity too so double whammy.

i am not sure my salt shaker would be all that effective against an oil pan fire.

Any you can use the teatowel to ward of the thieving chavs.

This is the vehicle in question. The Schleissheimer Strasse was blocked yesterday while the measurements were taken.

I was about to start a new topic today entitled "Cables all over town" or something like that as I had seen these cables everywhere...





Had I not asked a worker what they are doing, I would still have started a new thread. As it happens though, I did ask and he said they are measuring hot water. Seemed a bit odd to me as the probes seemed to be stuck in the ground but not very deep.

Then I found thit thread again just before I was about to post and can only assume that these are the sensors that pick up the reflected waves from the big thumpy machine above. I drove past them yesterday but missed my chance of a pic.

Can anyone confirm if this is what is happening or shed any more insight into how exactly they are doing this?

OK, so I re-read the first post and it mentioned geophones.

So thinking those things I saw could be geophones, I googled it and...



Pretty much like what I saw. So that confirms it. Those lines of orange things in my pics are the geophones.

Ran into one a few weeks ago whilst driving the kids in the bike trailer. Held up an entire street it did.

Now if they'd offer to turn the hot air I spout out every night on TT into electricity we'd make a fortune...

What was going on beside the A8 motorway just south of the Infineon complex up until a couple of months ago? Some sort of drilling rig sent clouds of steam across the motorway for several months. Someone at work told me it was a thermal energy experiment but I never saw any report about its outcome. (Apologies it this has already been discussed at length but I did look...)

I saw a live demonstration of this a few weeks ago, during a training seminar on firefighting at the local fire brigade. Quite impressive. But I don't quite understand what that has to do with geothermal energy. How does that work? Do they want to extract the hot water that is already down there? Or is the idea to pump in cold water which will heat up, then pump it out again? Is the issue that the cold water could heat up too quickly, resulting in a steam explosion?

That was just eurovol's analogy regarding the dangers of extracting hot water. But unlike Basel or wherever seismic activity resulted from blasting caverns to access the hot water vein Munich just drills big-ass holes right into its strata as the bedrock seems to be structured like a layer cake.