Category: Lava Flow

Geology Hawaii Lava Flow Satellites Science

Lava transforms a Hawaiian bay into a blackened peninsula

sudshr47 June 6, 2018

TwitterFacebook

The shallow, tropical waters of the Big Island’s Kapoho Bay are no longer: Satellite images show a bay overtaken by lava, transformed into a black mass of land jetting into the sea.

Lava meeting the ocean is, of course, the way Hawaiian islands grow. Unfortunately, the rumbling flow of lava from the Kilauea volcano engulfed more than 130 homes in the neighborhoods of Vacationland and Kapoho Beach Lots — including the home of the Hawaii County Mayor — before oozing to the beach.

As of June 6, the island’s Civil Defense agency said lava is still actively pouring into the ocean, where it produces dangerous clouds of acidic steam, filled with natural glass particles. Read more…

More about Science, Lava Flow, Hawaii, Satellites, and Geology

View More Lava transforms a Hawaiian bay into a blackened peninsula
Hawaii Lava Lava Flow renewable energy Science

Hawaii relies on dirty fuel after lava shutters its geothermal plant

sudshr47 June 1, 2018

TwitterFacebook

Hawaii has bold plans to completely ditch fossil fuels over the next few decades, but Kilauea’s lava flows have put a wrench in the Big Island’s ability to harness renewable energy from the volcano.  

Earlier this week, lava flows entered the grounds of the Puna Geothermal Venture (PGV), a power plant that generates about 25 percent of the island’s power, according to the both the island’s electric company, Hawaii Electric Light, and the state’s Public Utilities Commission. 

In anticipation of an unprecedented lava flow into a geothermal plant, the energy facility shut down in early May, and since then has removed flammable chemicals from the site and capped its steaming wells — one of which has already been blanketed in lava. Read more…

More about Science, Lava Flow, Hawaii, Renewable Energy, and Lava

View More Hawaii relies on dirty fuel after lava shutters its geothermal plant