6G-ENABLED Integrated Sensing and Communications to Tackle Climate Change: the Geothermal Sensing and Monitoring Model and its Implications

Climate change-induced natural disasters are seriously affecting the planet's ecosystem and disrupting the socio-economic development of humanity. This exigent issue leads to the developing of novel technologies and methodologies to utilize sustainable energy sources such as geothermal. However, geothermal reservoirs are highly location-specific, and identifying the potential zones is a daunting task for reservoir engineers. Moreover, the geothermal energy density of a place can change over time due to various environmental factors; therefore, it is crucial to monitor and assess its changes periodically. Concurrently, the accelerating advancements in the research of sixth-generation (6G) wireless networks and their possible disruptive technologies, such as integrated sensing and communications (ISAC), have recently received much attention from the broader research communities. In this article, we envision and introduce the general concept of a generalized geothermal sensing and monitoring (GeoSM) model and explore the role of the ISAC system in the localization and periodic monitoring of geothermal energy. Specifically, we illustrate the envisioned system architecture for the GeoSM model, present a general framework of the 6G-enabled ISAC system, and suggest possible enabling technologies to facilitate the distributed sensing and monitoring of the geothermal energy zones. Then, we describe the geothermal heat network as a prospective use case of the GeoSM model. Following that, we present a preliminary case study on the waveform optimization of our proposed ISAC framework of the envisioned GeoSM model for a specific application scenario. Finally, we outline the open research challenges and discuss possible future research directions.