Review and investigations on geothermal energy extraction from abandoned petroleum wells

Abstract

Geothermal energy is a sustainable and renewable energy source, which can be used in electricity production, space heating/cooling, and other industrial applications. In the recent years, it has been gathering more and more attention due to its numerous advantages as low impact on the surrounding environment, continuous power outputs, low greenhouse gas emissions, and worldwide availabilities. All make the geothermal energy a significant contributor to the global energy productions in an environmentally friendly way. One big concern of geothermal sources’ exploration is the expensive investment costs of geothermal wells. Utilizing abandoned petroleum wells for the purpose of geothermal extraction is a novel idea. Well temperature profiles help to estimate how much heat can be transferred and produced from the wells. In this paper, a literature review has been done to investigate the existing applications on geothermal energy extraction utilizing abandoned petroleum wells. Then, the case study demonstrates the importance of properties of working fluids, wellbore architecture, and operational parameters (circulation rate, inlet temperature, etc.) in geothermal energy production. The obtained results can be used to achieve an improved data interpretation and generate more optimal solutions. In geothermal projects, extensive knowledge of the heat transfer is of great importance for the economical aspect and the performance of wells. Our work demonstrates that it is a good approach to provide cost-effective solutions to enhance heat extraction from geothermal wells.