| Abstract |
Geothermal energy use in Slovenia has been followed on regular basis since 1994. A small but constant progress was achieved in geothermal development during the last five years in Slovenia, especially in its northeastern part, belonging to the Pannonian Basin geothermal region. New geothermal boreholes were drilled there with good characteristics and depths between 1.2 and 1.5 km. The one for greenhouse and soil heating of the tomato production has been active since 2013 at Renkovci while two (a production and reinjection borehole) for the planned district heating of some parts of the Murska Sobota town are currenty inactive. They all tap thermal water from the Late Miocene (Pannonian-Pontian) sand aquifer with temperatures of 55 to 65 °C. Beside the Renkovci tomato company also two other new direct heat users appeared, one in eastern part in Dobova (hotel Paradiso), which uses thermal water of 56 °C from the Triassic dolomitic aquifer, and Toplice Kopacnica in western part, a rather small user, which exploit thermal water of 24 °C from the Late Triassic dolomites. The installed capacity and annual energy use of 32 users amount to 67.1 MWt and 636 TJ, including Renkovci. Greater progress is visible in shallow geothermics, where the number of smaller geothermal heat pump (GHP) units of typically 12 kW is cca 7500 with 74.3 MWt capacity and 415 TJ/yr energy use (May 2014). The number of greater GHP systems with heat pumps of rated power over 20 kW is in constant increase during the last 5-8 years, resulting in 11.3 MWt and 86.3 TJ/yr, with some 54 systems accounted for so far, however, there are at least 35 such installed systems, mostly in public or private buildings (schools, kindergardens, factories, etc) with currently unknown data. The total incomplete numbers are 153 MWt and 1137 TJ/yr. Drilling activity was much lower with ca 5.3 km of new boreholes, both production and exploration, including the temperature gradient boreholes. It’s expected that trend of energetic renovation of older buildings and installation of the GHP units will continue in future as one of the obligations to reach the renewable energy targets. |