Geothermal Power In Greece  

Spero News reports that interest in geothermal power is beginning to bubble up in Greece - Geothermal power to light up the Aegean.

While the countdown continues for Greece to meets its Kyoto Protocol and EU targets on greenhouse gas emissions, a vast supply of clean and continuous energy is, literally, sloshing around underfoot.

Geothermal power - the energy derived from stores of superheated water and steam in seismically-active areas - could, according to geologists, offer a realistic alternative to fossil fuels in the production of electricity and position the country as a regional leader in what is a growing global market.

Despite the Institute of Geology and Mineral Exploration (IGME) establishing the existence of 30 geothermal fields in Greece - two of them sizeable enough to produce at least 250MW of uninterrupted electrical power - geothermal energy remains non-existent among the country's 900-plus megawatts of electricity produced from renewable sources.

Indeed, according to an energy profile of Greece in a US Commercial Service report last year, there are up to 2,000MW of electrical output available from 'high temperature fields' across the country. The IGME puts the figure at a more conservative 500MW.

Either way, with the country committed to the EU's so-called 20:20: 20 legislation (20 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, 20 percent energy production from renewables and 20 percent energy saving relative to 1990 levels by 2020) and the Kyoto Protocol requirement to limit to 8 percent the rise in the country's greenhouse gas emissions by 2012, energy providers have been keen to size up the full potential of Greece's geothermal fields.