USGS

"The house of America is founded upon our land and if we keep that whole, then the storm can rage, but the house will stand forever." – President Lyndon B. Johnson

Despite the easy association of American culture with prosperity and modernity, historically, it was America’s National parks that were seen as a reflection of national character, as well as national priorities.

Travel to America’s National Parks, and you are quickly reminded that it is not our wealth, not our cars, not our designer boutiques, our high rise buildings or our suburban homes that define America. Rather, as so many have said, it is these parks that are the crown jewels of our country.

I was reminded of this over the last two weeks as I hiked through the lunar landscape of Utah’s Capitol Reef National Park and the pine forests, streams and crystal blue lakes of California’s Yosemite National Park.

But I also learned something new and disturbing: All is not well in America's National Parks, where the impacts of climate change are already apparent, not only where I hiked, but in parks all across the nation.

Google likes to tout Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) as "the sleeping giant" of clean power. The United States Geological Survey (USGS), it seems, would wholeheartedly agree.

This week, USGS scientists released the agency’s first assessment in more than 30 years of the electric power generation potential of the nation’s geothermal resource.

What'd they find?

If developed, geothermal could generate 556,890 MW of electricity in the United States. That’s more than 200 times the installed geothermal capacity in the nation today, which stands at 2,500 MW.