Techno-Economic Analysis for a Potential Geothermal District Heating System in Tuttle, Oklahoma

Sertac Akar, Hyunjun Oh, Koenraad Beckers, Cesar Vivas, Saeed Salehi

Research output: Contribution to conferencePaper

1 Scopus Citations

Abstract

Geothermal deep direct use (DDU) has potential across a wide swath of the United States but is underutilized due to challenging project economics associated with developing a deep geothermal resource for a large-scale and variable heat demand. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and University of Oklahoma evaluated the feasibility of a geothermal district heating (GDH) and cooling system in two schools and 250 houses by utilizing existing oil and gas (O&G) wells in Tuttle, Oklahoma. Heating and cooling demand in the two schools and a typical single-family house were modeled using EnergyPlus building energy simulation software. The modeling results indicated that annual heating demand in two schools and 250 houses is approximately 2.61 GWhth, and cooling demand in the two schools is approximately 2.65 GWhth. In this scope, the techno-economic analysis (TEA) was conducted using the GEOPHIRES tool combined with the TOUGH2 reservoir simulator. The reservoir performance, including geothermal heat production capacity, was modeled by the reservoir simulator TOUGH2. Then, levelized cost of heat (LCOH) was calculated using GEOPHIRES version 3.0, which includes new features such as hourly heat load optimization and peak performance evaluation. Geothermal reservoir temperature was estimated as 90.5 degrees C at a total depth of 3.3 km by the regional average temperature gradient of 22.8 degrees C/km and validated by cation geothermometer calculations. Four production scenarios with two different well configurations and two different heat load profiles have been developed for well flow rates ranging between 3.1 kg/s and 9.3 kg/s. The LCOH of the district heating and cooling system was calculated between $95 and $210/MWh ($28/MMBtu to $62/MMBtu) for four different production scenarios. Typical natural gas prices for residential customers in Oklahoma have ranged from 9 to 19 $/MMBtu over the past decade, which indicates a challenge for deployment of such a GDH system.
Original languageAmerican English
Pages2129-2144
Number of pages16
StatePublished - 2023
Event2023 Geothermal Rising Conference - Reno, Nevada
Duration: 1 Oct 20234 Oct 2023

Conference

Conference2023 Geothermal Rising Conference
CityReno, Nevada
Period1/10/234/10/23

Bibliographical note

See NREL/CP-5700-86946 for preprint

NREL Publication Number

  • NREL/CP-5700-88689

Keywords

  • deep direct-use
  • district heating
  • geothermal heating and cooling
  • low-temperature geothermal
  • repurposing
  • repurposing of oil and gas wells
  • techno-economic analysis

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