Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

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Reika
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Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

Mod Info:
Solar is great and all, but if you want your factory to function during the night, you need enough accumulators that you could put Elon Musk and his Tesla gigafactories to shame. Nuclear power solves that option, but good luck finding and mining enough uranium until the very late game, especially if you play with tiered ores. And it, if you have the mods for it, can turn your factory into a radioactive wasteland. Boilers and steam is easier and more reliable, but does not scale that well, and pollutes enough that your factory looks more like 1900s London than the pristine land it once was.

Enter geothermal power. Tap into the hot rock deep underground, and use that to boil easy-to-obtain water into steam, without burning anything. Granted, it has one hell of a startup cost - each well will set you back a significant amount of resources, not to mention the heat exchangers and steam engines or turbines. And it requires power to continue operation; rely on it exclusively, and the first significant brownout might become a death spiral to total blackout. And of course you have to find such an upwelling of hot water first.

But it costs nothing consumable except for water, and pollutes very little. And a sufficient-size plant can easily eclipse even a handful of reactors.

Has integration with AlienBiomes if present: Geothermal upwellings only occur in volcanic biomes, but are plentiful throughout.
Screenshots/Video:
A sample geothermal plant (30-60MW capacity):
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Another plant, this one designed to come online as a backup:
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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by akiraic »

I'll download it when get home but for now:

This mod has 2 structures, right?
One for the heat source, other to boil the water?
What is that red thing? Is it possible to make just 1 structure over the heat source with 1 in (water) 1 out (steam)?

But i believe the way you setup all this is to make things "not that easy" and create some balance. If yes, then fine.

Thank you!

[EDIT]

I downloaded it and... the hot stuff is water? You use hot water to boil water into steam? What? That makes no sense. If the water is already hot from geothermic heat, it would be already steam, and if it isn't steam, it means it isn't even hot enough to boil MORE water. Hot water + water = colder water, NOT even HOTTER water. What is this exactly?
I mean, loved the mod, you were the first to implement such nice idea. It's just.. it just breaks basic logic in so many ways..

TIP TIP TIP: If you changed the hot water output to HEAT output using heat pipes, like in the reactors, that would solve every logic and physics problems and still keep your design safe, altho the second building wouldn't be necessary anymore, as the game already has one heat+water boiler.. well, anyway, thx!

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

akiraic wrote:I'll download it when get home but for now:

This mod has 2 structures, right?
One for the heat source, other to boil the water?
What is that red thing? Is it possible to make just 1 structure over the heat source with 1 in (water) 1 out (steam)?

But i believe the way you setup all this is to make things "not that easy" and create some balance. If yes, then fine.

Thank you!

[EDIT]

I downloaded it and... the hot stuff is water? You use hot water to boil water into steam? What? That makes no sense. If the water is already hot from geothermic heat, it would be already steam, and if it isn't steam, it means it isn't even hot enough to boil MORE water. Hot water + water = colder water, NOT even HOTTER water. What is this exactly?
I mean, loved the mod, you were the first to implement such nice idea. It's just.. it just breaks basic logic in so many ways..

TIP TIP TIP: If you changed the hot water output to HEAT output using heat pipes, like in the reactors, that would solve every logic and physics problems and still keep your design safe, altho the second building wouldn't be necessary anymore, as the game already has one heat+water boiler.. well, anyway, thx!
Do you not know how real Geothermal plants work?

And nothing other than reactors can produce Factorio heat - the API does not allow it.
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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by akiraic »

Oh I do know. Hot liquid coming from the main plant isn't the issue here. I'm talking about second building, where hot liquid + cold liquid = steam happens, that was the subject of my first questioning.

About the "API doesn't allow it". Is it possible make another entity using the reactor as base, changing the graphics + allowing a input/output?

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

akiraic wrote:Oh I do know. Hot liquid coming from the main plant isn't the issue here. I'm talking about second building, where hot liquid + cold liquid = steam happens, that was the subject of my first questioning.
The boiling point of water is a function of pressure, and it is easily possible that the pressures in the return loop are high enough to prevent boiling. Additionally, that return water is likely contaminated with minerals that would make it unsuitable for direct use in a turbine. If you mean that the heat exchanger should also produce cold return fluid, yes, but there is literally nothing that can be done with that unless you turn on the fluid requirement option.
akiraic wrote: About the "API doesn't allow it". Is it possible make another entity using the reactor as base, changing the graphics + allowing a input/output?
Then it would also inherit all reactor behavior, including requiring nuclear fuel, always consuming said fuel, having adjacency bonuses, and so on.
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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by akiraic »

Well now, everything is clarified. I'll keep using it.

Thanks for all, and good job!

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by FactorioParadox »

Reika wrote:
akiraic wrote:Oh I do know. Hot liquid coming from the main plant isn't the issue here. I'm talking about second building, where hot liquid + cold liquid = steam happens, that was the subject of my first questioning.
The boiling point of water is a function of pressure, and it is easily possible that the pressures in the return loop are high enough to prevent boiling. Additionally, that return water is likely contaminated with minerals that would make it unsuitable for direct use in a turbine. If you mean that the heat exchanger should also produce cold return fluid, yes, but there is literally nothing that can be done with that unless you turn on the fluid requirement option.
akiraic wrote: About the "API doesn't allow it". Is it possible make another entity using the reactor as base, changing the graphics + allowing a input/output?
Then it would also inherit all reactor behavior, including requiring nuclear fuel, always consuming said fuel, having adjacency bonuses, and so on.
Sorry to revive an old conversation, but what about creating a mod that replaces factorio heat with a functional counterpart (along with boilers, reactors, and heat pipes)? In fact, I may have seen something like that on the mod portal but it did more than just that.

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Light »

Fun bug with the coloured patches:

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Only the regular one (Top) spawns anything. The blue, green, and purple patches fail to operate.

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Aphlaptic »

I like this mod, especially combined with Alien Biomes.

But what is up with the well pollution? Pretty sure there's an error, because a single well produces 16K/s. The only thing worse that comes to mind is meltdown reactor from Realistic Reactors.

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

Both of these should be reported on the GitHub.
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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Light »

No other dev needs that kind of special treatment.

After all, these are the Factorio Forums. Reporting bugs here is perfectly logical for every other mod developer, even for those without their own dedicated board. A github account isn't needed for the game so why should we be expected to create an account on an unrelated website and report problems there instead of the Factorio forum board made specifically for your mods?

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

Light wrote:
Mon Apr 01, 2019 9:09 pm
No other dev needs that kind of special treatment.

After all, these are the Factorio Forums. Reporting bugs here is perfectly logical for every other mod developer, even for those without their own dedicated board. A github account isn't needed for the game so why should we be expected to create an account on an unrelated website and report problems there instead of the Factorio forum board made specifically for your mods?
Because the forums have no ability to focus a discussion - it intermingles posts based on time, irrespective of topic - nor the ability to readily track the progress of a discussion on the platform, and, unlike these forums, I actually get notifications for new GitHub issues.

Like I explained in the "rules/things to read" sticky thread, which you appear to have either failed to read or refused to acknowledge, these forums are for discussion, things like new feature suggestions, conversations regarding balance, or general inquiries. Things which involve a great deal of back-and-forth and multiple people's input, and which are not muddled by someone posting an unrelated question in the middle. Bugs are none of those things, and are more effectively and more usefully tracked elsewhere.
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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Bishop89 »

Anyone else having issues with 0.17 update? seems like incorrect sprite


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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Pizze »

Reika wrote:
Mon Apr 01, 2019 8:22 pm
Both of these should be reported on the GitHub.
Ignoring the rest of the discussion here: Someone already opened a bug on Github that looks like the mentioned issue on Github.
I confirmed the bug on my own and because I desperately wanted to play with this mod, I looked into the code and fixed two issues ready to be merged. :D

My factory is not ready to use this energy right now, but I want to start playing with it this evening. Of course I'm using my patched version and I would be glad if you would share it with all the other players waiting for this. :D

The second bug I fixed, was the incredibly high pollution that a geothermal well was producing. It was 16000/m. I'm not sure if it shouldn't be removed completely, but I reduced it to the production multiplier that can be set in the mod configuration which is usually 1.

Interested people can find a more detailed description on Github.

If it would be realistic, it wouldn't produce pollution at all (if pollution equals CO²). Any opinions on that?

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by JaJe »

Hi Reika
Congratulation for this wonderful mod!

However I noticed that the geothermal water exchanger needs 2,4 seconds to consume 8 geothermally heated water, 20 water and to produce 180 steam.

In fact it takes much less than 2.4 seconds, more like 0.5 seconds? I am not sure if is intended or bug.

https://i.imgur.com/ohKrxf4.jpg

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by FuryoftheStars »

Hi Reika,

I've reloaded this mod recently to try using again (it was conflicting with another mod). First, I wanted to say thanks for including the additional settings for controlling the frequency, etc of the geothermal vents.

That said, would it be possible for you to expand the minimum values or, perhaps better, decrease the default number of wells? Using Alien Biomes, on a map with all settings at default, the number of spawned geothermal vents is very high. Can't really use the land for much else.... :P

Geothermal frequency.png
Geothermal frequency.png (190.97 KiB) Viewed 10507 times

I found your constants file and decreased your default value to make it all less dense (0.25 -> 0.01), though I imagine each time you update the mod this may be overwritten.
My Mods: Classic Factorio Basic Oil Processing | Sulfur Production from Oils | Wood to Oil Processing | Infinite Resources - Normal Yield | Tree Saplings (Redux) | Alien Biomes Tweaked | Restrictions on Artificial Tiles

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by capthavic »

Stupid question but do you have to research the technology first for the geothermal nodes to appear on the map? Tried everything else but they aren't showing up for me.

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

capthavic wrote:
Tue Jun 25, 2019 6:58 am
Stupid question but do you have to research the technology first for the geothermal nodes to appear on the map? Tried everything else but they aren't showing up for me.
No, that is not even possible with the game API.


If you have AlienBiomes, they are specific to a couple biomes.
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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by capthavic »

Reika wrote:
Tue Jun 25, 2019 9:31 am
capthavic wrote:
Tue Jun 25, 2019 6:58 am
Stupid question but do you have to research the technology first for the geothermal nodes to appear on the map? Tried everything else but they aren't showing up for me.
No, that is not even possible with the game API.


If you have AlienBiomes, they are specific to a couple biomes.
Weird, don't know why it's not showing up then. Tried it with and without Alien biomes (and even turning off all unrelated mods), changed setting to all biomes and increased freq/size, messed around with all the terrain sliders, etc. Maybe I'm just missing something obvious but no clue what.

Oh well, still like the idea and hope I can figure it out eventually :)

Edit: Not sure if related but tried downloading the High-res Alien biome terrain and after that I finally found some geothermal nodes on a snow map.

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Re: Geothermal - A clean, but powerful power source all day long

Post by Reika »

capthavic wrote:
Tue Jun 25, 2019 9:51 am
Reika wrote:
Tue Jun 25, 2019 9:31 am
capthavic wrote:
Tue Jun 25, 2019 6:58 am
Stupid question but do you have to research the technology first for the geothermal nodes to appear on the map? Tried everything else but they aren't showing up for me.
No, that is not even possible with the game API.


If you have AlienBiomes, they are specific to a couple biomes.
Weird, don't know why it's not showing up then. Tried it with and without Alien biomes (and even turning off all unrelated mods), changed setting to all biomes and increased freq/size, messed around with all the terrain sliders, etc. Maybe I'm just missing something obvious but no clue what.

Oh well, still like the idea and hope I can figure it out eventually :)

Edit: Not sure if related but tried downloading the High-res Alien biome terrain and after that I finally found some geothermal nodes on a snow map.
Terrain sprite resolution definitely would not affect it.
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