By Rich Bowden:
Federal Resources and Energy Minister Martin Ferguson has said the opening of a geothermal energy project in South Australia offered a “great opportunity” to develop renewable energy in Australia.
Nesjavellir Geothermal Power Plant, Iceland. Credit Gretar Ívarsson
Speaking on Friday at the opening of the Panax geothermal project near Penola on South Australia’s Limestone Coast, Ferguson said the site offered would “test the potential of the region in the development of the renewable energy.
“The Panax project is a pioneer in the exploitation of hot sedimentary aquifers in Australia,” he said. “It will also test the potential of the Limestone Coast for geothermal development.”
” There is potentially a resource of up to 1500MW available in this region, which importantly, is located close to existing electricity grid connections,” he added.
The minister said preliminary testing by Geoscience Australia had confirmed the existence of vast geothermal resources in Australia, which could provide clean base-load electricity for the country’s energy needs.
“Preliminary analysis by Geoscience Australia suggests that extraction of one per cent of the energy from Australian geothermal sources could yield 190 million petajoules of energy. This is 26,000 times our primary power usage of 2005.”
“Geothermal energy is particularly important because of its potential to supply base-load electricity to the Australian grid from a zero-carbon renewable source. In doing so, it meets our objectives to increase energy security by diversifying energy sources, reduce Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions and to supply 20 per cent of Australia’s electricity by 2020 from renewable sources.”
Panax successfully applied for $7 million under Round 1 of the Australian Government’s $50 million Geothermal Drilling Program, said the ministerial press release.
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For more on renewable energy options, see Australian Energy Review section.