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Geothermal energy has been utilized by humans for millennia. While the first-ever use may be a mystery, we do know the Romans tapped into it in the first century for […]
The post Geothermal Energy Storage: The Clean Power Solution You Haven’t Heard Of appeared first on POWER Magazine.
The first geothermal power plant built in more than three decades within the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) balancing authority has come online. Mammoth Pacific Geothermal, an Ormat Co. subsidiary, declared the 30-MW Casa Diablo IV (CD4) commercially operational on July 20.
CD4 is located on public land two miles east of the Town of Mammoth Lakes in Mono County, California. The project is part of the Mammoth complex, which includes three other plants—one completed in 1985 and two added in 1990—each with a generating capacity of approximately 10 MW. The complex taps into the Long Valley Caldera’s hydrothermal system at a point where the hot water is only a few hundred feet below ground.
CD4 comprises two Ormat Energy Converter (OEC) binary generating units, each 21.2 MW, and vaporizers, turbines, generators, air-cooled condensers, preheaters, pumps and piping, and related ancillary equipment. OEC binary generating units are based on an Organic Rankine Cycle, and work by vaporizing a secondary working fluid (organic, with a low boiling point) that is heated by the geothermal fluid extracted from an underground reservoir.…
Geothermal energy has been around forever, used as a heating source across the world. Today it has surfaced as another renewable resource, with advancements in drilling technology bringing down costs and opening new areas to development.
In conjunction with the feature article on geothermal in the May 2019 issue of POWER, we sought opinions from a pair of leading experts in the sector: Will Pettitt, executive director of the Davis, California-based Geothermal Resources Council, and Torsten Rosenboom, a partner in the Frankfurt, Germany, office of global law firm Watson Farley & Williams LLP.
POWER recently interviewed Pettitt and Rosenboom to get their opinions about the future of geothermal energy:
What can we expect with regard to global growth in geothermal energy? Are there any regions where significant growth is expected?
Pettitt: Geothermal energy, I believe, has a really exciting and bright future. Geothermal power is a renewable energy that provides flexible baseload. It can provide the electricity grid with resiliency, reliability, and stability as we transition to more and more renewable fuels.…