Would This Happen Today?

In 1971, a site was identified by Soviet scientists as an area that was believed to house a substantial oil field in Turkmenistan.

Drilling began but the ground beneath the drilling rig soon collapsed, creating a wide crater that was believed to be releasing large quantities of methane gas, a potential danger to the nearby villages in Derweze, Turkmenistan.

Scientists decided that the most efficient way to solve the problem would be to burn off the poisonous gases - by doing so, it was expected that all of the gas in the crater would be burnt off within days.

More than four decades later, though, the crater is still ablaze with endless flames and boiling mud - and hundreds of tourists flock to visit it every year.

The Karakum Desert, where Derweze is located, has one of the largest gas reserves in the world.





Should science have found a way to harness all that lost energy? What contributions to CO2 emissions would something like this cause?

Does it bring into question the dangers of drilling/fracking near built up areas and does it reinforce the need for more green energy even if the cost if higher?

Re: Would This Happen Today?

Well without knowing much about it so can't really comment yet it must though be one scary place to visit, a real eye opener.

Re: Would This Happen Today?

It has never occurred to me that a hole like that could develop so I was wondering if today, it would be dealt with more efficiently and if it can happen once, can it happen again!

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Can't see it happening where people live as such. The earth's crust must be wafer thin in that area and stuff like that must be easy to pick up nowadays.

Where the earth's crust is fairly thin can be a great asset as it is possible to use the heat in loads of ways but of course where the earth's crust is too thin - as above - you have the problem of transporting the energy long distances which probably renders it useless.

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I hope we could use it someway these days but they don't seem to know how to put it out is a bit worrying.

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Hmm, I hadn't thought about the Earth's crust having varying thicknesses either (seems I'm not in a thinking mood today )

Now that's interesting - do you have any more info on that?

Re: Would This Happen Today?

I'm looking at that crater thinking of my gas bill next month and I'm slowly starting to cry.

Re: Would This Happen Today?

I got the wrong end of the stick with regard to this post. The fire was started deliberately - doh. For some reason I thought it was a thin crust above molten rock.

As far as burning gases off above a oil field this was and is common practise I think. If you watch old films with regard to small oil drill platforms and the like you would see a spout of flame where they did as the scientists did - burn the gases off.

Thinking about this I am not so sure. It could be the flames only appeared if things went wrong. I do know they had to cap the drill holes to stop either too much pressure of oil of to stop the flames maybe.

Would this happen today? Not on the scale of the initial post. The waste of gas must have been collosal and that must be a tremendous waste of dosh.

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Geothermal Energy

I actually stayed in Denmark with a friend where this was in situ. Heat was piped to the homes from stations driven by the earth's own heat. A free hot water supply .

Re: Would This Happen Today?

oh bless - I'm feeling sorry for you now