Creating a Geothermal Atlas of Hungary

Abstract

Hungary’s excellent geothermal potential is well-known. Traditionally, most of the country’s thermal water has been used for spas. Most of the geothermal energy production is used as a direct heat supply, to heat housing projects and businesses. As yet, there is no operational geothermal power-plant in Hungary. Neither is the market for ground-source heat-pumps very strong, perhaps because of a depressed economy that has still not recovered from the global recession. Despite the weak economy, however, a few large-scale projects are being prepared. These are hindered by the absence of a strong, reliable and official government authority which can absolutely and unequivocally vouch for Hungary’s geothermal data. For this reason, the Hungarian Energy and Public Utility Regulatory Authority requested in 2016 that a study be made, to analyze and summarize the geothermal potential of every one of the country’s 19 counties. The resulting study used information from the Hungarian Geological and Geophysical Institute, and consulted the geothermal databases of the Hungarian Office for Mining and Geology. These two sources yielded data for 1622 thermal wells. In addition, more than 170 abandoned hydrocarbon wells were also analyzed, as the Hungarian Mine Utilization Company judged those wells to be suitable for geothermal use. In the course of assembling the necessary data into a national geothermal atlas, numerous smaller-scale charts and graphs and maps were also created. In addition to creating a solid informational basis where none had existed before, the study was valuable as a means of showing all 19 Hungarian county governments how they might profit from their geothermal potential.