Open Access Publication of the Month – David Franzmann, Prof. Dr. Heidi Heinrichs, Dr. Prof. Detlef Stolten (ICE-2) et al.
5 June 2025
To encourage us all to broaden our horizons, each month the Central Library selects one open access publication from the JuSER publications portal to be featured in the newsletter of Forschungszentrum Jülich.
In the latest open access publication of the month, David Franzmann, Prof. Dr. Heidi Heinrichs, Dr. Prof. Detlef Stolten (ICE-2) et al. write about the global energy cost potential of geothermal power plants, which could prove a useful addition to wind and solar energy due to their controllability.
Controllable geothermal power plants can play an important role in energy systems achieving greenhouse gas neutrality. However, there is still a lack of sufficiently detailed information worldwide about the energy cost potential. This paper now closes this gap and provides important data to the scientific community.
The results show that land eligibility is strongly dependent on local conditions, ranging from below 5 % to 72 %. The global average is 25 %. Global hotspots for geothermal energy at less than € 0.05 per electrical kilowatt hour (kWhel) are mainly found in developing countries in South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia, as well as in Russia, Iceland, Hungary, and Japan. Deep geothermal energy can therefore be a cost-effective and reliable source of electricity for developing countries. However, its use in developing countries depends on reducing the cost of geothermal drilling. In industrialized countries such as the USA, Japan, and China, geothermal energy can only cover part of the country’s energy needs due to the higher overall energy demand there.
The open access publication entitled “Global geothermal electricity potentials: A technical, economic, and thermal renewability assessment” was published in the journal Renewable Energy.
JuSER publications portal – DGlobal geothermal electricity potentials: A technical, economic, and thermal renewability assessment
Forschungszentrum Jülich – Central Library (ZB) – Open Access