Preparatory work on Geothermal Frontier Project sites in Japan to start this year
Mount Iwate and Mount Kurakake from Shizukuishi Town, Iwate Prefecture, Japan (source: Yasu, CC BY-SA 3.0 
Carlo Cariaga
6 Jul 2026
JOGMEC expects to start preparatory work at three geothermal sites in Japan selected under the Geothermal Frontier Project.
The Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC) have indicated that preparatory construction work will be starting this year for three sites selected for the “Geothermal Frontier Project.” Three of the sites are located in Shizukuishi Town in Iwate Prefecture and another one is in Yuzawa City in Akita Prefecture (as ThinkGeoEnergy had previously reported on).
Under the Geothermal Frontier Project, the government will take the lead in undertaking resource surveys in geothermal sites that have been identified to have high potential. Development work will be undertaken by the government up to and including drilling and testing of exploration wells. If development is deemed promising, the drilled wells will be transferred to private companies as requested.
The candidate sites in Shizukuishi Town are the Amihari area, SW of Mount Iwate, and the Marumori area near the border with Akita Prefecture. The drilling of water wells and removal of existing facilities will be done at the Amihari area. Meanwhile, environmental surveys in preparation of the construction of access roads will be done at Marumori. Hot spring monitoring will be done at both locations.
The candidate site in Yuzawa City is in the upper region of the Minase river. The permits related to doing the exploration work at the Kurikoma National Park are expected to be secured within the year. Raptor surveys for environmental monitoring will also be done. If all goes well, the project will proceed to the construction of access roads.
For all candidate sites, once preparatory work is done, the projects will proceed to the drilling of exploration wells to depths between 1000 to 2000 meters. Well tests will then be done to evaluate the productivity of the wells. Even after the wells have been handed over to private companies, the government commits to continuing to support environmental impact assessment and development work.
Source: NEWS.jp
