University of North Dakota nets $3.5 million in grants for geothermal development
By: Staff Report, Grand Forks (ND) Herald
Scientists at UND recently received two grants totaling $3.5 million for their ongoing geothermal energy development program, the school said Monday.
The grants come from the U.S. Department of Energy and will be used to explore electric power generation from geothermal resources in the western part of North Dakota.
“Pursuing new frontiers in energy research is one of our strategic priorities at UND Engineering,” Hesham El-Rewini, professor and dean of UND’s School of Engineering and Mines, said of the grants in a press release. “These two awards … recognize the quality of the research conducted by our faculty and students.”
The researchers who received the grants are William Gosnold, Chester Fritz distinguished professor and chair of Geology and Geological Engineering; Mike Mann, professor and chair of Chemical Engineering and Hossein Salehfar, professor and vice chair of Electrical Engineering.
“This is a remarkable opportunity for the state of North Dakota to lead in developing a sustainable, environmentally sound, domestic energy resource,” Gosnold said in the release, noting the partnership of local and state agencies, as well as the petroleum industry and private entrepreneurs.
The grants to UND are part of a $338 million federal program to support the exploration and development of new geothermal fields and research into advanced geothermal technologies. The grants will support 123 projects in 39 states.
The UND grants are part of a project selected for the development of new low-temperature geothermal fields, a vast but untapped set of geothermal resources. It includes geothermal heat found in the hundreds of thousands of oil and gas wells around the U.S., where as many as 10 barrels of hot water are produced for every barrel of oil.
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