| Abstract |
The management of a geothermal power plant can be significantly different to most other power projects. Firstly, the fuel supply and the working fluid form an integral part of the operation, rather than being brought in from outside. Secondly, initial fuel and fluid properties are often poorly understood, making accurate observation of long-term trends essential. Furthermore, the project may attract substantial resource consent reporting requirements. Steamfield Manager is specifically designed to manage this unique geothermal data environment. It has a hierarchical relational database structure that provides both a short-term and a long-term perspective, allowing the program to manage normal operational processes, as well as looking after data over years or even decades. Besides maintaining detailed records of each steamfield configuration, Steamfield Manager is able to make thermodynamic, network, revenue and other calculations, to generate resource consent reports, and to monitor long-term trends, both above ground and within the geothermal reservoir. |