Australia to tap "hot rocks"

Just a day after Google announced it is to plough $10m into projects geothermal energy research, the Australian government has pledged to stump up $43m to help develop technologies capable of tapping the country's huge geothermal potential.

The money is expected to be used to fund a number of pilot projects across the country designed to determine the best technology for generating power from Australia's "hot rocks".

The announcement came on the same day as research from government-backed agency Geoscience Australia based on data collected from 5,722 boreholes suggested that just one per cent of the country's geothermal reserves could provide 26,000 years of energy supplies.

A separate viability study from the Australian Geothermal Energy Association predicted that the country could produce 2,200MW of power from geothermal sources by 2020, accounting for 40 per cent of its renewable energy target.

The association estimated that delivering 2,200MW of power would cost A$12bn, but predicted that costs would fall rapidly as the industry scales up, eventually reaching a point where geothermal represents the lowest cost form of renewable power.

Speaking to Reuters, Resource Minister Martin Ferguson signalled the government's support for the technology, claiming that is it would "provide clean base-load power and is potentially a very important contributor to Australia's energy mix in a carbon-constrained world".

The announcement comes just two months after Australian firm Green Rock unveiled plans for a 400MW geothermal power station in South Australia that it predicted could deliver enough power for 400,000 homes.