§17195 Geothermal Energy Production From Oil and Gas Fields and Recovery and Production of Geopressured Gas Resources

Summary

The Secretary must set up a program to research, develop, test, and help bring to market ways to get geothermal power from oil and gas wells and to recover energy from geopressured resources (hot, pressurized underground water and gas). The Secretary must run a grant program that funds at least three demonstration projects using geothermal systems like advanced organic Rankine cycle units. Each project should cover at least five well sites, use hot water sources from 150°F to 300°F, include systems up to 1 megawatt, be placed at different kinds of sites, be repeatable at many places, help pick the best techniques, include business plans for mass production and wide operation, and meet any other needed criteria. No money under this program can be used to drill new wells. Each grant must pay for site engineering, detailed local economic studies, feasibility checks for replication, design or adaptation of the technology, equipment installation and support, at least 1 year of operation plus monitoring, and validation and records of lessons learned. For geopressured resources, the Secretary must ask for preliminary designs, award cost-shared grants to finish detailed plans, and then award cost-shared grants to build demonstration production facilities that show economic promise to recover heat, kinetic energy, and gas. At least 90 days after December 19, 2007, the Secretary must run a national, competitive call for these grant applications.