Sen. Murkowski promotes geothermal energy at Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing
As chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) recently took the opportunity to host a hearing on geothermal energy development and the promotion of its use.
Murkowski highlighted the system’s success in her home state of Alaska, where it accounts for 2.4 gigawatts of potential generation. The hearing also primarily revolved around a recent report from the Department of Energy known as GeoVision: Harnessing the Heat Beneath Our Feet, which discussed the technical and non-technical barriers that have been traditional obstacles to geothermal use.
“It shows that if we can address them, through policy and innovation, this resource can make a huge contribution to America’s energy future,” Murkowski said. “Regulatory reforms alone could double geothermal capacity. And technology improvements focused on exploration, discovery, development, and management of these resources could greatly increase geothermal power generation.”
Daniel Simmons, assistant secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, stated his belief that technology improvements could help geothermal generation to more than 26-times its current usage. It also has the added benefit of being another, greener source of energy.
“Geothermal meets these requirements with new plants that have little to no emissions, little water use, and a significantly lower land-use footprint than other energy technologies,” Katherine Young, geothermal project manager at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, said. “The economic benefits are equally impactful. Geothermal creates more local long-term, wage-earning jobs, includes more local spending during construction and operations than other power technologies, and provides more affordable, less volatile consumer energy prices nationwide.”
