Underground Rivers - University of New Mexico

Chapter 9 -- Thermodynamic Engines
A fire smoldering within a cavern nicely, if incorrectly, explains
the report in Adams County [Iowa] Free Press, October 18,
1913.
A peculiarity of some of the streams on Switzerland is that a
number of them have their source from canyons which are
underground passages. One at Ragaz, known as the
Taminaschlucht, comes out at the foot of a mountain, and a
foot way has been constructed so that it may be entered for a
distance of about half a mile to a place where the stream
gushes our of a subterranean opening to its full capacity, and
at one side there is a second opening from which hot water
flows.
The Taminaschlucht gorge is 100 meters deep and 10 meters
wide. A tunnel leads to a grotto having a 37°C thermal spring.
In at least this instance, hypothesizers of hot and cold
subterranean plumbing were close to the mark.
What we now know of geophysics supports in loose degree even a transmutational basis for
springflow, if one allows chemical reactions to count as transmutation. Some hot-spring effluent
is "juvenile," newly formed by volcanic or tectonic processes.
While condensation may be inconsequential in most groundwater
environments, again the early speculators were onto a legitimate idea.
The micro-hydrologic water balance in large cave systems -- especially
ones in which there are large differences in temperature -- can be
significant. In certain Crimean and Caucasian karst regions, between
0.1 and 20 percent of dry-season runoff is said to be derived from
subterranean condensate, the illustration to the right serving as an
illustration.
The heat of the earth does not drive underground rivers uphill, but in limited cases, geothermal
energy plays a role in groundwater flow. The hydrophylacia so well advertised by Kircher do not
exist, but again in limited cases, Chapters 51 and 42 containing examples, mammoth
subterranean caverns evidence subterranean streamflow.
And we're not done with subterranean hydrologic engines, or at least imaginative propositions for
the task.
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