China’s war on geothermal resources exploitation: In order to make geothermal energy as 15% of all primary energy source by next decade, China is laying enormous emphasis on geothermal exploration in the 12th five year plan. This is not a surprising news for, the geothermal energy available in China is equivalent to about 360 million tones of coal and help the country to reduce carbon dioxide emissions drastically. Estimates show that the available geothermal energy source can help China to reduce carbon dioxide by 50 % of the current emission. SINOPEC is setting up state of art technology centre to promote technology development to support geothermal exploration strategies. Very soon China will lead in geothermal energy utilization, according to Keyan Zheng, director of Geothermal Resources Research Centre in China Energy Research Institute. He made this statement at the recently concluded Geothermal Resources Council Annual meeting, held at Reno, USA. China is currently generating about 32 MWe from geothermal fields located in NE Himalayas, falling within the Himalayan geothermal belt that extend from J&K to Arunachal Pradesh.
Philippine’s 20-MW Maibarara is all set to take off soon. This project has started 3 years ago and will start generating power by 2013.
Olkaria Geothermal field is channg the life style of the rural population. “We could go a week without working. But now there isn’t one day without work” says Elizabeth Kyalo, a salon owner in Nairobi, Kenya. The Olkaria geothermal field made all that difference to her. The Olkaria geothermal power plant is able to supply un-interrupted power supply to the Kenyans.
Kenya has set a goal to produce 5000 MWe by 2030 from geothermal resources. Kenya has 14 geothermal sites that are ready for development. The most promising and high potential fields are Olkaria and Menengai. GDC estimates a potential of 1000 MWe from Olkria and 1600 MWe from Menengai. With this future expansion plan, Kenya will have surplus electricity and will be in a position to support other neighbouring states like Uganda and Tanzania until these countries will be in a position to exploit its EGS resources in future from high heat generating granites like the Singo granite. A rough estimate shows that 1 sq.km granites of this category are capable of 24464 x 1012 kWh of electricity. African countries are in a position to become energy independent compared to other Asian countries by tapping its geothermal resources and become a leader in implementing CO2 mitigation and CDM strategies.
Tanzania’s Minister for Energy and Minerals, Prof Sospeter Muhongo said that geothermal exploration work will start along the lake Ngozi in Mbeya that shows promising high temperature geothermal zones. If all goes well, the country will be surplus in geothermal energy in the near future.
GeoSyndicate Power Pvt. Ltd is waiting for tariff fixation from the Govt. This is holding its further activities in Godavari rift geothermal site. PPA was signed nearly an year ago. This will be done in a few weeks from now.