Geothermal energy : the potential in the United Kingdom

The marked increase in energy prices in the mid-1970s focused attention on the fact that conventional energy sources are finite. This realisation led to an acceleration of investigations into the feasibility of using sources of energy other than fossil fuels and nuclear energy. Of these so called renewable forms of energy only geothermal resources are currently making a significant contribution to the world's energy needs. The United Kingdom is not a region that is immediately associated with geothermal energy. But the geothermal gradient, which is similar to the world average, gives temperatures of 60° to 75°C at depths of 2 km in many areas, sufficient for a wide range of energy demands. Furthermore, geothermal resources are being developed in the Paris and Aquitaine basins in France, as well as in the Pannonian Basin in Hungary, under somewhat similar geological conditions to those that exist in the United Kingdom. In view of this, the Department of Energy, in collaboration with the Commission of the European Communities, invited the British Geological Survey to investigate the geothermal potential of the UK.