Wasted Heat Energy

Alaska has more than thirty known hot springs discharging water with temperatures in excess of 40 C (104 F). For the most part, the heat energy available in the spring water is not used by man and therefore could be considered as wasted.

What does this wasted energy represent in dollars lost each year? If one assumes that the energy in the hot water could be partly extracted and used instead of that gained from heating oil, a fairly simple calculation can be made. So doing, one finds that the heat available from Chena Hot Springs is the same as that available from about 90 gallons of stove oil each hour. Stove oil costs more than one dollar per gallon in remote parts of Alaska and much less in the larger urban areas. If we assume a delivered cost of one dollar per gallon at each site, then we calculate that the annual cost of the heat wasted is $800,000 at Chena Hot Springs, $410,000 at Circle Hot Springs and $650,000 at Manley Hot Springs. At those three sites alone this is nearly two million dollars a year wasted.