ThinkGeoEnergy – Geothermal Energy News

Scientists exploring option to utilise geothermal for heating in Northern Siberia

Scientists are exploring the potential of utilising geothermal energy for heating in Northern Siberia the vast Russian province encompassing most of Northern Asia.

Reported locally, scientists of the Institute of Oil and Gas Geology and Geophysics in Novosibirsk are currently conducting a study on geothermal energy potential in the north of West Siberia. This was announced by Dimitry Novikov, Laboratory Head and project manager.

Siberia is a vast Russian province encompassing most of Northern Asia, with terrain spanning tundra, coniferous forest and mountain ranges including the Ural, Altai and Verkhoyansk. Lake Baikal, in its south, is the world’s deepest lake, Lake Baikal.

“The total heating capacity of the West Siberian artesian basin is more than 200 mln Gcal per year,” Novikov told Russian news agency TASS last week.

He said many northern settlements have infrastructure for the construction of geothermal plants. “Such plants can be built in remote settlements in Siberia’s north,” the scientist said. He said deep wells had been drilled in many Siberian regions in the Soviet times in search for oil and gas.

“If no hydrocarbons were found, we got thermal water sources there,” he said.

According to Novikov, the transformation of these wells into heating plants will not require much spending. Russia’s largest geothermal power plants are located on the Far-Eastern Kamchatka Peninsula and on the two Kuril islands (Iturup and Kunashir).

Source: TASS

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