The agreement between the Minister of Climate and Environment and the Mineral and Energy Economy Research Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences for the implementation of the “Optimal management of low-temperature geothermal reservoirs - Polish-Icelandic cooperation in the field of deposit modeling (acronym GeoModel)” project was signed on December 16 2022. This project will be financed from the Bilateral Cooperation Fund of the European Economic Area Financial Mechanism 2014-2021 and the Norwegian Financial Mechanism 2014-2021 under the Environment, Energy and Climate Change Programme.

The main goal of the GeoModel project is to improve the management of geothermal resources exploited in low-temperature reservoirs in Poland and Iceland, and in a broader sense - also in other countries. At the same time, it should be noted that the project does not concern very shallow geothermal energy, but classical geothermal systems of medium and deep depth, where the geothermal fluid is present in a pore or fissure-porous medium as a liquid.

Low-temperature (or low-enthalpy) geothermal systems, as they generally yield less energy, are often not as closely monitored as high-temperature resources. It happens that reservoirs with low-mineralized waters are exploited without injection, which, without proper monitoring, may lead to excessive exploitation and, as a result, to a pressure drop in the entire reservoir, which in turn may result in a decrease in efficiency also in the adjacent wells. A simple and cheap solution to this problem is to keep an observation log (database), which should record the main parameters of the exploited resources, such as pressure at the wellhead, temperature and efficiency. This makes it possible to observe disturbing changes in the deposit early enough and to take an appropriate reaction, e.g. reduce water intake, increase injection or make new, necessary holes.

The second tool, extremely helpful in the sustainable management of geothermal resources, is the creation of numerical models of geothermal reservoirs, which allows simulations of numerous variants of future exploitation, and as a result, forecast possible threats (excessive pressure drop or temperature in the deposit). Unfortunately, numerical modeling is not widely used (especially in Poland), which can be mainly explained by the time-consuming and high costs of such work, and sometimes by the lack of appropriate data for building or calibrating the model.

The aim of the GeoModel project is to improve the quality of management of low-temperature geothermal resources by facilitating access to appropriate reservoir modeling tools and promoting the advantages of regular and meticulous resource monitoring. Reducing the barriers related to access to software for modeling geothermal reservoirs should contribute to this. The project will develop tools that will support the calibration of numerical models, will enable modeling of heat transport and water flow in highly saline reservoirs (such as in the Polish Lowland) and will be helpful in calculating parameters at well heads, as well as support the decision-making process regarding the optimal location of future drillings.

The "Optimal management of low-temperature geothermal reservoirs - Polish-Icelandic cooperation in modeling deposits" project will be implemented in cooperation with the Icelandic partner Iceland Geosurvey (ISOR). The bilateral character will be clearly marked by active cooperation on the creation of new solutions in the field of numerical modeling of geothermal systems, which, despite significant differences in the geological structure of Poland and Iceland, are described by the same physical processes. Cooperation between the two units will be based on the exchange of experience, joint study visits, publications and reports. The developed tools will be thoroughly tested on data from selected geothermal fields in Poland and Iceland.