| Title | Geothermal Energy Use, Country Update for Switzerland |
|---|---|
| Authors | Link, K; Rybach, L; Wyss, R; Imhasly, S |
| Year | 2016 |
| Conference | European Geothermal Congress |
| Keywords | Geothermal, direct use, heating, cooling, heat pumps, borehole heat exchangers, spas, tunnel water, agriculture, feed-in tariff, risk coverage, petrothermal, EGS, Switzerland |
| Abstract | So far there is no power generation in Switzerland. On the other hand, Switzerland is an internationally prominent player in shallow geothermal energy technology, thanks to the widespread geothermal heat pump installations. These systems, providing space heating, cooling, and/or domestic hot water, are growing steadily. In 2014, the total drill-length of borehole heat exchangers was about 2,500 km. The areal density is still highest worldwide. In 2014, the total installed capacity of all heat pump systems was 1816.8 MW (Figure 6), whereof 84.3 % (1531.7 MW) were installed in borehole heat exchangers, 14.1 % (256.5 MW) in groundwater systems, 1.0 % (19 MW) in geostructures, 0.3 % (5 MW) in deep aquifer systems, 0.2 % (3.8 MW) in tunnel water systems and <0.1 % (0.8 MW) in deep borehole heat exchangers. In 2014, the heat production amounted to 3037.3 GWh (real operating data), with a geothermal and thus renewable energy part of 2277.5 GWh. Geothermal heat pump systems for space heating provided the main part of heat production (2790.1 GWh). Of this, about 85 % came from systems with borehole heat exchangers (2385.3 GWh). The remaining heat pumpbased utilisation was made up by groundwater systems (344.3 GWh), geostructures (39.5 GWh), deep aquifers (13.5 GWh), tunnel water (5.8 GWh) and deep borehole heat exchangers (1.7 GWh). Direct geothermal heat use without heat pumps was applied mainly for thermal bathing (242.1 GWh) and a doublet system for district heating (3.1 GWh) in Riehen near Basel. At the tunnel of “Lötschberg” a large part of the geothermal heat (2 GWh) was used directly for fish farming (Tropenhaus Frutigen). Since 2008, geothermal power production has been supported by a national geothermal exploration risk guarantee and by a feed-in tariff. In contrast, there is no national direct incentive scheme for utilising geothermal energy for heating and/or cooling purposes, but a number of Switzerland’s 26 cantons provide investment subsidies for ground source heat pumps. |