Increasing gas prices and the great potential of geothermal in Croatia
Karlovac, Croatia (source: flickr/ János Korom Dr., creative commons)
Alexander Richter
17 Oct 2021
As in other countries increasing gas prices are of concern and make nations look for tapping a local resource, such as geothermal energy for heating purposes.
In a recent interview in local news outlet TPortal, Marijan Krpan, President of the Management Board of Croatia’sHydrocarbons Agency highlights his country’s huge potential in geothermal energy sources, which Europe also favours.
As in other countries, the increasing energy prices are increasingly of concern and in the interview Mr. Krpan explains the trends on energy prices driven by the global economic recovery. Demand is high, but oil production does not follow this trend. Namely, currently the world is looking for 101 million barrels of crude oil per day, and 99.7 are produced.
‘There is a difference of 1.3 million barrels a day which is the main reason why prices are going up. But oil needs to be refined, and then we also have a market for petroleum products where the Mediterranean is traded, and the so-called future contracts that you can now buy in December or January next year. They are a couple of dollars cheaper than today’s oil price. So this is an indication that the situation could stabilize in the long run, but due to this imbalance in the short term possibly a jump and because of that the Government wanted to prevent a possible rage in prices, ‘Krpan explained in the HRT daily.
But there are additional concerns beyond oil and that is an expectations of a drastic increase in gas prices as already experienced across Europe. Citizens fear an increase in gas prices that should happen in April, after the end of the heating season.
‘The price of gas has been at a record high these days. The main reason is the high demand in Asia. Asia is waking up. As it is all a global market, LNG has gone a lot towards Asia. In Europe, the main story is with Russia and the issue of the final realization of the North Stream. Everything else is marginal issues. In that sense, Croatia did everything it could. It has its own production covering 30 percent. It has an underground gas storage facility that has a capacity of half a billion cubic meters. So, there is the LNG project, which is proving to be one of the crucial factors in this crisis because it has a different supply route, ‘said Krpan, adding that he believes that there will be gas.
There is though the opportunity to tap into a national natural resource and that is geothermal energy. The potential to tap this resource is huge so Mr. Krpan.
‘Currently, the [Hydrocarbon] Agency has received HRK 230 million (around EUR 31 million) through EU funds through the Recovery Plan for the research of geothermal plants for the needs of district heating. This is something that Europe favours and we will face in the future. There are great possibilities for the use of geothermal energy in agriculture, the Slavonia project, and also for the production of electricity, there are certainly a number of projects that we can implement ‘, concluded Krpan.
Source: TPortal
