Hot dry rock power generation and energy storage

What is a hot dry rock (HDR) or Enhanced Geothermal System (EGS)?

Hot Dry Rock (HDR) or Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) utilize volumes of rock in the Earth's crust that have been heated to useful temperatures through abnormally high heat flow, but have low permeability or are virtually impermeable.

How a hybrid solar and geothermal system can help a hot dry rock project?

All these measures can contribute greatly to hot dry rock or EGS projects in terms of raising power generation capacity and mitigating the risks of the hydraulic fracturing induced earthquake. Additionally, the hybrid solar and geothermal system performs better than the stand-alone geothermal system.

What is Hot Dry Rock (HDR) development?

Hot Dry Rock (HDR) development involves forming geothermal reservoirs in granitic formations that have high temperature but very low permeability and lack of stored fluid. The first site for this work was the Valles Caldera in New Mexico at the Fenton Hill project.

What is hot-dry-rock (HDR) energy?

The clean and renewable hot-dry-rock (HDR) energy accounts for 99% of the total geothermal resources and has encouraging potential for heating and electricity generation [1,2].

How do hot dry rock geothermal resources form?

Hot dry rock geothermal resources form in the state of storage geothermal heat in rocks at a depth nearly 10 km from the Earth’s surface. These resources are characterized by limited fractures or pore spaces, which results in the absence of water or unified rock porousness, making them difficult to extract heat from economically using ordinary steam or heated water.

Can geothermal power plants generate electricity from hot dry rock?

The electricity generation from the hot dry rock or EGS project is not commercial yet, and the geothermal power plant scale is mostly smaller than 2 MW so far. The flow rate obtained so far is generally less than 40 L/s even with hydraulic fracturing operation conducted in the tight reservoir.