5.089

Seventy-two miles north of San Francisco, California are naturally occurring steam field reservoirs below the earth's surface that environmentally fuel The Geysers, the largest geothermal power producer in the world. It generates approximately 725 megawatts of electricity, enough clean, renewable energy for 725,000 homes and businesses, or, a city the size of San Francisco.

Magma Power Company drilled the first commercial geothermal well at The Geysers in 1955. Five years later, construction began on the first, 11-megawatt, commercial geothermal plant in the U.S. Union Oil Company of California (Unocal) took over operations of the steam fields and continued to contribute technical and financial resources so exploration and development could expand.

The Geothermal Resources Council was formed in the1970s to encourage global development of geothermal resources. At the same time, the U.S. enacted the Geothermal Steam Act that gave the Secretary of the Interior authority to lease public and federal lands for environmentally sensitive geothermal exploration and development. This added to the expansion of The Geysers.

New technology introduced recycling geothermal wastewater back into the “production zone” and more U.S. companies geared up to develop geothermal resources to generate electrical power and direct-heat. Improvement in deep-well drilling led to deeper reservoir drilling and access to more resources. The Geysers continued to expand.

Total steam production at The Geysers peaked in the late 1980s at nearly 250 billion pounds; an annual average of 2,000 megawatts. And just when the clean and green energy project was preparing for another expansion, things began to slow down. The Geysers was literally running out of steam! The plant pumped so much steam, the natural underground reservoirs were running dry.

The only solution was to find water and make more steam. The local power company offered to provide wastewater from the community, but it would require building a 40-mile pipeline to get it up to The Geysers. Community and state funds paid for the pipeline. Water levels and steam pressure returned as 30,000 liters/min. of water ran through the pipeline into The Geysers.

The Geysers celebrated 40 years in operation, with 350 steam wells and approximately 80 miles of pipelines, in the year, 2000.



Jason Grace
on behalf of the
BascoTec Internet Limited
Technologie Park 13
33100 Paderborn
Germany

Recommend or share this page: