The Heat Beneath Your Feet: UK Geothermal Heat Potential in Political Constituencies
At TownRock Energy we are excited to see what a new Labour government means for the growth of geothermal energy in the UK as part of their plans to “make Britain a clean energy superpower”. We are pleased to share our Opportunity Brief for how we think this undervalued resource can play a large part in achieving the UK’s Net-Zero targets.
Geothermal energy (heat sourced from beneath the ground) represents a vast resource for low carbon heating and cooling for homes and businesses across the UK on our path to Net Zero. While the UK may not have geological conditions akin to Iceland to allow the generation of electricity from steam commonly associated with the term “geothermal energy”, there is a vast underdeveloped resource available to provide steady heating to millions of homes and businesses across the country.
This report presents the geothermal resources across various Westminster constituencies. The maps show the two key geothermal heat resource types in the UK, Mine Water and Hot Sedimentary Aquifers (HSA) and highlight the fortuitous extent of overlap between resource and demand (i.e. population centres).
Mine Water Resource Areas
This map shows the location of former coal mining areas where heat could be extracted from workings (labelled “Mine Water Resource Area”), as well as the locations of existing Coal Authority mine water treatment schemes.
25% of the UK housing stock lies above coal mines, with enough energy in the flooded mine workings to heat 7 million homes.
In the full report (Appendix 1) we have identified the 221 political constituencies (correct for 2024 General Election) in which there is the opportunity to utilise mine water energy.
Hot Sedimentary Aquifer (HSA) Resource Areas
This map shows the key areas of the UK underlain by a Hot Sedimentary Aquifer (HSA) resource.
Lighter shades of purple indicate the broad outline of where the rocks are likely to contain sufficient heat and groundwater (labelled “HSA Resource Areas”). We have then applied our expert subsurface knowledge to deduce the darker shaded areas as the best areas to drill for heat (“HSA Best Resource Areas”).
Appendix 1 in the report lists the constituencies which are underlain by the more general HSA Resource Areas (320 constituencies) as well as those underlain by the Best HSA Resource Areas (79 constituencies)
You can read the full report here. TownRock Energy would be pleased to discuss the contents of this report further, having been a key player in the development of UK geothermal heating systems to date. With ambitions to lead the growth of this important low carbon energy sector, we are poised to assist the Government to return energy affordability and security to the British people.