United States needs to make geothermal more important

So the good news for the US geothermal industry is that the tax incentives for geothermal energy projects have been extended but the bad news is that U.S. geothermal energy sector is still far from becoming an important player on U.S. renewable energy map.

Wind are solar are still getting the lion share of new renewable energy investments. If we compare the installed capacity of wind, solar, and geothermal for 2012 we can see that geothermal is far behind these two renewable energy sources (the U.S. installed around 12,000 MW of new wind power capacity in 2012, more than 3,000 MW of solar, and only 147 MW of new geothermal power capacity).

Even this small increase in geothermal power capacity represented a 5% increase compared to previous year which gives the clear picture about the current lack of popularity that geothermal energy seems to have among U.S. investors.

GEA, however, still hopes that the extension of tax credit for geothermal will attract major investors into new geothermal energy projects with Karl Gawell, executive director of the Geothermal Energy Association, recently claiming that this could lead to about $4 billion of new investment in geothermal projects.

Geothermal energy, however, will still struggle to find its place on U.S. energy map- not only are solar and wind more popular than geothermal but there is also natural gas, an energy source that is thanks to recent shale gas discoveries cheaper than ever before.

What this means is that geothermal industry needs new technologies that would make new geothermal energy projects more cost-competitive, particularly in decreasing the huge exploration and drilling costs. The example of promising new geothermal technology is EGS (enhanced geothermal systems) though there are still some issues that this technology needs to resolve (such as the possibility of leading to seismic events).

United States will hopefully give lot bigger importance to geothermal energy in years to come. Unlike solar and wind geothermal energy doesn't suffer from intermittency issue and is therefore more reliable and doesn't require some backup energy solution like solar and wind do in times when sun doesn't shine and wind doesn't blow.

The 2012 MIT report said that geothermal energy in the United States has the potential to lead to an installed capacity of 100,000 MW within the next 50 years. The potential is there, and it's up to right energy policy to do the rest.