House subcommittee spotlights geothermal as part of US ‘national energy strategy’

Members of the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources took a field trip this week to Utah to visit a new Fervo Energy geothermal development and hold a hearing about geothermal energy being developed on federal land.

In his opening statement, Representative Pete Stauber (R-MN) highlighted geothermal’s potential to help satisfy the “unprecedented growth in energy demand” the US will face as a result of data center load growth—and the importance of its inclusion in Republicans’ “all of the above” energy dominance strategy. But, he said, federal permitting timelines for geothermal development are too slow and “mired by duplicative requirements and lengthy regulatory delays.”

“We can and must do better to address these barriers,” Stauber said. “I’m proud to say that House Republicans are leading the charge to end these inefficiencies and unleash geothermal energy on federal lands.”

Tim Latimer, the CEO and co-founder of Fervo Energy, said in his testimony that permits can delay construction up to 10 years, thereby delaying geothermal energy’s “positive impact.”

“We’ve had numerous projects where we’ve had community support, we’ve had high-quality geology, we’ve looked at and had some sort of transmission solution,” Latimer said,” but we haven’t even prioritized investing in the project yet because we didn’t see a viable pathway to getting permits.”

Witnesses also focused on geothermal’s economic capacity: Latimer said Fervo plants create “good paying jobs that don’t disappear when construction ends”, and Paul Thomsen, VP of business development at geothermal power company Ormat Technologies, said that Ormat employs locals at rural geothermal sites and that geothermal plants on federal land can boost surrounding communities.

“When you produce power 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, and sell that electricity under a power purchase agreement, you create a good amount of revenue,” Thomsen said. “A huge portion of that goes back to the local counties. In states that have a lot of federally owned land, where they’re not always getting the payment in lieu of taxes from the federal government, these projects have an astonishing effect.”