To Jennie Jorgenson, conserving money is as important as conserving any other resource. That’s why she takes the bus to from Boulder, Colorado, to her job at the National Renewable Environmental Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, where she’s part of a team that models clean energy development across the United States and the world.
Growing up in North Dakota, events in her past inspired her to work in the renewable energy field. While earning her undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering at the University of North Dakota, she experienced two 100-year floods of the Red River. After interning at NREL, she earned her master’s in Mechanical Engineering at University of Colorado – Boulder, where she experienced yet another 100-year flood.
“I’ve seen the destruction caused by severe weather events firsthand,” Jennie said. “With a changing climate, these events may increase in frequency and magnitude, so I’m worried for the future and the damage these changes could do to the environment.”
How renewable energy can help the Salton Sea
With support from the Walton Family Foundation, Jennie and the rest of her research team at NREL recently developed the model for California’s 2030 Low Carbon Grid Study. The model compared options for drastic carbon emissions reductions in the state, including the status quo and a scenario with higher geothermal development. While geothermal energy is costly, it provides an always-on power source with less wasted energy than sources such as solar, which can generate lost energy when the sun is shining but demand is low.
In a version of NREL’s model where geothermal energy represented about a quarter of the state’s new renewable portfolio, nearly all of that generation came from the Salton Sea area.
The Salton Sea is an inland sea created when a Colorado River irrigation canal flooded in 1905. The lake has become an important ecosystem for migrating waterfowl. But with few natural water inflows in the Southern California desert, the lake depends on water from the Colorado River to stay full. However, in 2018 the Imperial Irrigation District will be cutting off that supply and sending the much-needed water to other places where it is in high demand, such as San Diego.
That cut-off poses problems for the deteriorating ecosystem, but also for the nearby Imperial and Coachella valleys which may suffer dust storms created by winds crossing the newly dried lakebed. To prevent this, the lakeshore must be restored to accommodate a lower lake level.
Geothermal development will reduce dust storm intensity by covering more of the arid lakebed with buildings, roads and other structures, provide revenue to fund shoreline restoration and significantly reduce California’s carbon pollution. While geothermal alone won’t solve all of the Salton Sea’s woes, it’s a good start.
Jennie sees renewable energy as an important tool for creating a lower-carbon future and reducing the risk of future extreme flood events, but she recognizes that clean energy must be cost-effective and reliable if investors and governments are to deploy it quickly.
“There are many pieces to the puzzle to getting to a lower carbon future for California, including energy efficiency and more effectively transmitting power,” Jennie added. “Geothermal energy can be a really important piece because it is energy that generates 24 hours a day, when people need energy the most.”
