MarkHarvey

Mark Harvey is currently in the final stages of his PhD. His research is concerned with mapping and quantifying heat flow from high-temperature hydrothermal systems and volcanos, and how this can be used to locate geothermal energy, a clean and renewable source of electricity. A high temperature magmatic hydrothermal system consists of a convecting plume of fluid, recharged at the margins by cool meteoric water. The cool water exchanges heat with a magmatic body at depth, then rises toward the surface as a high temperature plume of low density water and vapour. These systems can be tapped using deep wells to provide high temperature steam and clean, base-load electricity for the grid.

In mid-2015, he was commissioned by local government to undertake an experimental aerial thermal infrared survey of a geothermal area in New Zealand for environmental monitoring purposes. The research included the development of innovative geothermal heat flow mapping methods using a drone equipped with high-resolution thermal camera. This work was recently published in the Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research, and is probably the first ever square-km-scale, temperature calibrated and georeferenced image of a geothermal area ever produced by a drone equipped with a thermal camera.

November 2016