WASHINGTON, D.C. – As part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, the U.S. Dept. of Energy on Feb. 13 announced the selection of three projects that will receive up to $60 million to demonstrate the efficacy and scalability of enhanced geothermal systems (EGS).

Funded by the bipartisan infrastructure law, the pilot projects will use innovative technology and a variety of development techniques to capture the earth’s abundant heat resources. These projects will demonstrate the potential for geothermal energy to provide reliable, cost-effective electricity to tens of millions of U.S. homes and businesses and help deliver on the Administration’s goal of 100 percent clean electricity by 2035.

The three pilot projects are:

Chevron New Energies – This pilot demonstration will use innovative drilling and stimulation techniques to access geothermal energy near an existing geothermal field in Sonoma County in northern California.

Fervo Energy – This pilot within the Milford Renewable Energy Corridor in Utah and adjacent to the DOE’s Frontier Obervatory for Research in Geothermal Energy field laboratory aims to produce at least 8 megawatts of power from each of three wells at a site with no existing commercial geothermal power production.

Mazama Energy – This project will demonstrate a first-of-its-kind, super-hot EGS (temperatures aboved 375 degrees Celsius) on the western flank of Newberry Volcano in Oregon. This demonstration will help advance the science needed to operate in extreme heat conditions.

Geothermal resources currently generate about 4 gigawatts of electricity in the U.S.