Renewable Energy in Iceland
Iceland is the only country in the world which obtains 100% of its electricity and heat from renewable sources. 87% of its electricity comes from hydro-power, and the remaining 13% from geothermal power. Oil-powered fossil fuel power stations are only used as backups to the renewable …

Simple Geothermal Air Heating and Cooling
Domestic geothermal heating and cooling systems tend to be expensive - for example ground source heat pumps, and air source heat pumps. However, it is possible to make something yourself very inexpensively with the potential to make a significant reduction in your heating or cooling …

Larderello Worlds First Geothermal Power Station
The world's first Geothermal power station was built in 1911 in Larderello, in Southern Tuscany, Italy. Since Roman times steam and hot water springs emerging from this geologically active ground has been used for hot water and for bathing. In 1904 emerging steam was used to …

Eden Project Geothermal Power Plant
Plans have been revealed for what will be the first geothermal power plant to be built in the UK. In a joint partnership between EGS Energy - a geothermal power company - and the Eden Project in Cornwall, a 3MW geothermal power plant will be …

Air Source Heat Pumps
In our article Geothermal Heat Pump we introduced the ground source heat pump, a device which uses the heat stored in the earth to heat water for a home efficiently. Air Source Heat Pump An air source heat pump works in exactly the same way as a …

Geothermal Heat Pump
Geothermal heat pumps (aka ground source heat pumps) take advantage of the relatively constant temperature of the ground as a heat source and a heat sink to provide both heating and cooling for homes and offices. A liquid refrigerant is pumped from the outside to …

Radial Drilling for Ground Source Heat Pumps
One of the main points to come out of the recent Energy Savings Trust (EST) trials regarding heat pumps was that whilst such pumps are capable of producing relatively high coefficients of performance (COP), results showed that in many cases heat pumps were failing to …

Introduction To Geothermal
The centre of Earth is believed to be 5,500 degrees Celcius which is almost as hot as the surface of the sun. Geothermal (which literally means Earth Heat) energy is energy which is taken from inside the Earth and used by us. Even a couple …

USA Urged to Turn to Geothermal Power
A 15-month study from MIT sponsored by the US Department of Energy suggests that the USA, the world's largest electricity consumer, can replace a large portion of its increasing power needs with Geothermal power. Ageing nuclear power plants and coal-fired power stations will soon need …