Unlocking Geothermal Energy: Technology, Capital, and the Path to Scale

Geothermal power has been limited to a few regions with accessible heat close to the surface. New drilling techniques, enhanced geothermal systems and closed-loop designs could extend geothermal power beyond traditional locations. This would provide access to a scalable source of firm clean power. Commercial scale depends on lower drilling and resource costs, workable financing models and treatment of geothermal as infrastructure. The technology still has to prove itself economically. Exploration risk in particular remains difficult to finance. The discussion will focus on optimizing for exploration and discovery costs, financing models that absorb exploration risk, and the policy enablers needed to bring geothermal into the firm-power mix.