geothermal power

geothermal power, form of energy conversion in which geothermal energy—namely, steam tapped from underground geothermal reservoirs and geysers—drives turbines to produce electricity. It is considered a form of renewable energy.

History and use around the world

While humans have long made direct use of geothermal energy as a source of heated water, the first geothermal electric power generation took place in Larderello, Italy, with the development of an experimental plant in 1904. The first commercial use of that technology occurred there in 1913 with the construction of a plant that produced 250 kilowatts (kW). Geothermal power plants were commissioned in New Zealand starting in 1958 and at the Geysers in northern California in 1960. The Italian and American plants were “dry steam” facilities, where low-permeability reservoirs produce only steam that can be sent to a power plant through pipes and used for power generation right away. In New Zealand, however, high-temperature and high-pressure water emerges naturally as a mixture made up of 80 percent superheated water and 20 percent steam. This superheated water is separated from the mixture and flashed into steam for electricity generation. Most geothermal plants at present are of this “wet steam” type.

Although geothermal energy is abundant, geothermal power is not. With wide-scale adoption using current technology, it is estimated that about 8 percent of the world’s electricity could be produced by using geothermal resources. In addition, nearly 40 countries, most of which are located in Africa, the Pacific, and Central and South America, could conceivably meet all of their electricity needs by using geothermal resources. In the first quarter of the 21st century, geothermal energy was used to produce electricity in 27 countries, the leaders being the United States, the Philippines, Indonesia, Turkey, Mexico, New Zealand, and Italy. In 2020 geothermal power plants in the United States produced more than 8,831 gigawatt-hours, and in 2021 these plants had an installed capacity of more than 3,600 megawatts (MW)—the most of any country. California and Nevada had the most installed geothermal capacity, accounting for about 95 percent of U.S capacity. Still, in 2022 geothermal energy accounted for only 0.4 percent of all electricity generated in the U.S. In 2021 Kenya was the eighth highest geothermal electricity producer and had the largest percentage share of electricity generation from geothermal energy—generating more than 40 percent of the country’s annual electricity supply. Many geothermal fields have utilization factors of about 95 percent (equivalent to 8,322 full-load operating hours annually), the highest for any form of renewable energy.

Types of power generation

Geothermal power plants can produce electricity in three ways. Despite their differences in design, all three control the behavior of steam and use it to drive electrical generators. Geothermal power is considered a form of renewable energy because the excess water vapor at the end of each process is condensed and returned to the ground, where it is reheated for later use. In addition, the “waste” fluid from some power plants is often used for lower-temperature applications, such as the bottom cycle in a binary cycle plant, before being injected back into the reservoir. Such cascaded uses can be found in the United States, Iceland, and Germany.

Some geothermal power plants simply collect rising steam from the ground. In such dry steam operations, the heated water vapor is funneled directly into a turbine that drives an electrical generator. Other power plants, built around the flash steam and binary cycle designs, use a mixture of steam and heated water (wet steam) extracted from the ground to start the electrical generation process.

In flash steam power plants, pressurized high-temperature water is drawn from beneath the surface into containers at the surface, called flash tanks, where the sudden decrease in pressure causes the liquid water to “flash,” or vaporize, into steam. The steam is then used to power the turbine-generator set. Flash steam geothermal power production usually requires an input of fossil fuels and thus generates greenhouse gas emissions, though these are significantly smaller than those from electricity production driven by coal or natural gas combustion.

In contrast, binary cycle power plants use steam driven off a secondary working fluid (such as ammonia and hydrocarbons) contained within a closed loop of pipes to power the turbine-generator set. In this process, geothermally heated water is drawn up through a different set of pipes, and much of the energy stored in the heated water is transferred to the working fluid through a heat exchanger. The working fluid then vaporizes. After the vapor from the working fluid passes through the turbine, it is recondensed and piped back to the heat exchanger.

Electrical power usually requires water heated above 175 °C (347 °F) to be economical. In geothermal plants using the organic Rankine cycle (ORC), a special type of binary cycle technology that uses lower-temperature heat sources (such as biomass combustion and industrial waste heat), water temperatures as low as 85–90 °C (185–194 °F) may be used.

Geothermal resources in low-permeability rocks are often found, and a developing technology known as an enhanced geothermal system (EGS) could open the use of such geothermal resources. Instead of using existing vapor (dry steam) or liquid water (wet steam) geothermal resources, an EGS exploits hot dry rock resources underground, which typically contain little water in any form. Somewhat similar to fracking, used in natural gas and petroleum extraction, an EGS creates a subsurface fracture system that increases the permeability of the rock so that its geothermal energy can be used. A heat transfer fluid (typically water) is then injected into the fractured rocks, where it becomes heated, and is then returned to the surface to power turbines for electricity generation.

Extraction and exhaustion

Geothermal energy is best found in areas with high thermal gradients. Those gradients occur in regions affected by recent volcanism, in areas located along plate boundaries (such as along the Pacific Ring of Fire), or in areas marked by thin crust (hot spots) such as Yellowstone National Park and the Hawaiian Islands. Geothermal reservoirs associated with those regions must have a heat source, adequate water recharge, a reservoir with adequate permeability or faults that allow fluids to rise close to the surface, and an impermeable caprock to prevent the escape of the heat. In addition, such reservoirs must be economically accessible (that is, within the range of drills).

The heated fluid from a geothermal resource is tapped by drilling wells, sometimes as deep as 9,100 meters (about 30,000 feet), and is extracted by pumping or by natural artesian flow (where the weight of the water forces it to the surface). Water and steam are then piped to the power plant to generate electricity. In general, electric power plant pipelines are limited to roughly 1.6 km (1 mile) in length to minimize heat loss. Costs can be kept down by locating the facility near existing electrical transmission lines to transmit the electricity to market.

Geothermal resources are considered renewable but can be exhausted if the rate of heat extraction exceeds the rate of natural heat recharge. Normally, geothermal resources can be used for 20 to 30 years. However, the energy output may decrease with time, making continued development uneconomical. On the other hand, geothermal electric power has been produced continually from the Larderello geothermal field since the early 1900s and at the Geysers in California since 1960. Although there has been a decline in both of those fields, this problem has been partially overcome by drilling new wells and by recharging the water supply. At the Geysers, electrical capacity declined from 1,800 MW to approximately 1,000 MW, but about 200 MW of capacity was returned by placing the field under one operator and constructing pipelines to deliver wastewater for recharging the reservoir. Thus, with proper management, geothermal resources can be sustainable for many years, and they can even recover if use is suspended for a period of time.

Environmental effects and economic costs

The environmental effects of geothermal development and power generation include the changes in land use associated with exploration and plant construction, noise and sight pollution, the discharge of water and gases, the production of foul odors, and soil subsidence. Most of those effects, however, can be mitigated with current technology so that geothermal uses have no more than a minimal impact on the environment. EGS technology may cause seismic activity, and it usually relies on surface water resources, which may become contaminated with minerals in the fracture system. In addition, EGS and dry steam technologies require energy inputs—usually in the form of fossil fuels—and thus do generate some amount of greenhouse gases, though this is significantly less than the amount produced by electricity generated using coal or natural gas.

If one compares the benefits of geothermal energy with those of other renewable energy sources, the main advantage of geothermal energy is that its base load is available 24 hours per day, seven days per week, whereas solar energy and wind energy are available only about one-third of the time. In addition, the cost of geothermal energy varies between 5 and 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, which can be competitive with other energy sources, such as coal. The main disadvantage of geothermal energy development is the high initial investment cost in constructing the facilities and infrastructure and the high risk of proving the resources.