"Geothermal energy, towards global expansion" - IEA lists advantages compared to other renewable sources
"Geothermal energy could see transformative global growth thanks to advances in technology and expertise from the oil and gas sector," the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in a December report titled "The Future of Geothermal Energy." The agency has put its estimate of potential geothermal power generation capacity at 800 GW, nearly enough to supply the entire economies of the EU or the US.
According to Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the Agency, there is a huge untapped potential in geothermal energy to provide clean and secure energy worldwide that also solves the most fundamental problem of renewable energy: dependence on weather conditions. With electricity consumption expected to increase due to the increasing use of air conditioning, electric vehicles and data centers, this source provides a reliable alternative.
The potential of geothermal energy is massive. The Energy Agency has raised its estimate for total power available from the ground tenfold to 800 GW, just short of the roughly 1,000 GW the US or Europe generated last year, out of 16.3 GW produced globally in 2023.
This source will never replace solar and wind power, which will remain cheaper to produce and easier to install, but the report explains that it will account for 15% of the increase in capacity renewable energy until 2050.
Rapid expansion will be driven by the key advantages it enjoys over other renewables. First, it is completely emission-free, as it simply draws heat from the earth's core left over from planet formation, gravitational compression, and the radioactive decay of isotopes within the core. Also, this energy is limitless. Secondly, the energy produced is continuous, it does not depend on the weather or the daily cycle.
But to realize the 800 GW of capacity projected by the Agency, governments and private investors will need to spend about $1 trillion over the next decade, the same figure that has already been invested in wind power in the past seven years and in solar power only in the previous three years.
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