pepei.pennnet.com
23 October 2009
The UK Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has made available a GBP6 ($10m) fund for deep geothermal exploration. The fund, part of the DECC low carbon investment fund will help companies carry out exploratory work needed to find viable sites for this technology. Energy and Climate Change Minister, Lord Hunt said: "Deep geothermal energy is an exciting and innovative technology that could provide clean, low carbon and renewable power and heat for the UK.
"We want to make sure that this energy resource can play a part in the future low carbon energy mix. Deep geothermal power from the South West of England alone could meet two per cent of the UK's annual electricity demand, potentially creating thousands of jobs in the building and running of new power plants." There is currently one geothermal energy station in the UK - the Southampton District Energy Scheme. The station uses hot water pumped from 1800m below ground as part of the city's district heating network and has operated successfully for over 20 years, saving an estimated 11 000 tonnes of CO2 per year.
Projects in England, Scotland and Wales are eligible to bid to the fund. There will be GBP4m available this year and GBP2m next financial year. Project bids will be assessed and managed by panel established by the Department of Energy and Climate Change. The closing date for bids for the first round of the fund will be 20 November 2009 with the successful projects to be announced shortly after that.
0 comments:
Post a Comment