Scientific ? American

Scientific ? American -- comment on a comment on an article in Scientific American.

Geo = 3%, not .3% of total US electricity production.
therefore "Geothermal " [receives] ... .69, NOT "6.9 times the subsidies of Nuclear." Unfortunately Geo makes sense, not immediate profits. How about a "Project Hades" to demonstrate engineering and technical methodology where profits ($ & environmental) are little more than five miles from everywhere on earth? Unlimited energy, not disposable and transient commodities.

Compare the costs (direct and indirect impacts, $ and environmental) of fossil/nuc fuels, wind & solar with the costs of geo. AND the benefits (same). For the next 40 years.

Don't leave out the Fossil Fuel/Nuc Industrial Complexity: Mine/drill, refine, store, transport, store, burn/heat, dispose of waste and internal costs/complexities of each of those process steps.

And don't forget the taxpayer/investor costs/campaign contributions of Legislative/Legal/Political Industrial Complexities.

And transition costs/benefits in jobs, families, energy sourcing.

After you're done with a 75MW Geo plant, all the energy you'll ever need is available directly beneath your feet, with the added benefit of energy independence, no FFIC, no LLIC and no GHGs. Oops, sorry for the advocacy. Try it yourself:

http://geothermal.inel.gov/publications/future_of_geothermal_energy.pdf
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy12osti/52409-2.pdf
http://www.nrel.gov/analysis/staff_tssa.html