News
2010 Basin Research Student Prize for Elco Luijendijk
Luijendijk’s research may make an important contribution to the assessment of potential new geothermal energy sources in the future.
Elco Luijendijk, a PhD student in the Isotope geochemistry section, has won the 2010 Basin Research Student Prize. He was awarded this prize for his research presentation during the annual conference of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in San Francisco. Luijendijk’s research has contributed to knowledge about geothermal energy (the internal heat of the earth). This form of energy is still scarcely exploited and could contribute to reducing CO2 emissions and the use of fossil fuels.
The research
Luijendijk conducts research on subsurface temperatures and deep groundwater flow in the Roer Valley Graben, a sedimentary basin in the south-east of the Netherlands. In this basin, subsurface temperatures show a large spatial variation. In addition, the boundary between salt and fresh water is much deeper than previously expected. This suggests that there is a deep flow of groundwater. Computer models show that this flow of groundwater could lower the temperature by 20° at a significant depth (1 km).
The models show that even slight (130 m) topographical differences can cause sufficient groundwater flow to change temperatures in the subsurface. This conclusion is extremely valuable from a scientific perspective, for example, because the temperature history of rocks is often used to date and quantify the uplift or subsidence history of the earth’s crust. From now on, these temperature differences caused by groundwater flow will have to be taken into account. Luijendijk’s findings will also be important for assessing favourable places to extract geothermal energy.
Basin Research Student Prize
The Basin Research Student Prize is awarded annually by the journal Basin Research, a publication by the International Association of Sedimentologists and the European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers. The prize is awarded to young researchers working in the field of sedimentary basin research. It consists of a cash prize and a special commendation on the website of Basin Research.
