Geothermal energy

Contacts

The objectives of this programme of the ICS Environment Area  are:

• to make valuable scientific research for exploration and/or optimum exploitation of geothermal resources;
• to promote investigation of energy conversion technologies, and dissemination of these contributions for geothermal and industrial development in developing countries, in co-ordination with international geothermal institutions, universities, and other geothermal research centres, to complement and strengthen the subjects and topics of their programmes and activities;
• to provide the international geothermal community with e-learning facilities and reference geothermal library through modern communication tools.

Geothermal energy is the most convenient of all renewable energies since is the most environmentally benign and enjoys a cost effective conversion technology, having plenty of natural resources in developing countries; it is practically inexhaustible, it can provide electricity, heating or cooling, with presently available technologies, in an efficient way; it is presently exploited in 25 countries around the world; its future development has a very promising concentration in some developing world areas, notably some of the poorest countries of the African continent.

The interior of our Earth, at about 5,000 ºC is cooling off and releasing huge amounts of energy, certainly in large excess on the predictable energy needs of humankind for the future.   Extracting this energy in a practical and economic way is a complex task, but, fortunately, throughout the surface of the earth, at relatively low depths (some km below), the geophysical evolution of the planetary crust has localised deposits of hot fluid magma that will continue to disperse huge amounts of energy in the nearby rocks for thousands of years.  This hot subsurface in combination with pockets of rain water that has permeated the ground for hundreds or thousands of years, have formed geothermal water reservoirs (1 to 5 km below).   Such hot water and steam, with usable temperature and pressure will flow to the surface if wells are drilled, after the reservoirs have been identified and characterized.

Key topics:

Based on the results obtained in 2008 and 2009 through collaborative assessments of needs with developing countries and countries in economic transition involved in geothermal energy exploitation, the following key topics have been identified:

• geothermal energy resource exploration and evaluation technologies
• advanced methods in geothermal reservoir engineering
• socio-economical aspects of geothermal resources development
• low enthalpy geothermal resources and small scale geothermal power plants
• geothermal power plants technology and optimisation

Contacts:

Massimo Garzelli, Acting Area Chief

Mounir Ghribi, Associate Scientific Officer

Elisa Sarti, Senior Secretary

• research

  New applications and capacity building for developing countries in specific areas of applied sciences & high tech.

• fellowships

  Opportunities for strengthening capacities and developing competencies

• scientific events

  Upcoming and past events.

• networking

  A network of centres of excellence world-wide.

• e-learning

  The video-recording of ICS scientific events.