A new solution for harvesting energy simultaneously from two different sources of energy by combining geothermal energy production and thermal enhanced heavy oil recovery is introduced.
Numerical simulations are employed to evaluate the feasibility of generating energy from geothermal resources, both for thermally enhanced oil recovery from a heavy oil reservoir and for direct heating purposes.
The analyses suggest that the extra amount of oil produced by utilising the geothermal energy could make the geothermal business case independent and may be a viable option to reduce the overall project cost. Furthermore, the results display that the enhance oil productions are able to reduce the required subsidy for a single doublet geothermal project up to 50%.
Synergy potential for oil and geothermal energy exploitation, by Zaman Ziabakhsh-Ganjia, Hamidreza M. Nicka, Marinus E. Donselaara, David F. Bruhna. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2017.12.113. Applied Energy
Volume 212, 15 February 2018, Pages 1433–1447.
