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Geothermal energy to address energy performance strategies in residential and industrial buildings (GEO.POWER)
Start date: Oct 31, 2010, End date: Oct 30, 2012 PROJECT  FINISHED 

Geothermal Energy (the energy extracted from heat stored in the earth) is one of the most environmental-friendly and cost-effective energy resources in use and has the potential to help mitigate global warming if widely deployed in place of fossil fuel. Recent technological progress, the variability of the cost, the difficult of oil and gas supply, the need to reduce the use of fossil fuels to cut pollution have made the exploitation of geothermal energy, especially low-enthalpy power generation utilizing GCHP (Ground Coupled Heat Pumps) an attractive and viable alternative. Give these premises, the general objective of GEO.POWER project, 2 years long, is exchange best practices related to low enthalpy energy supply and - after a technical and cost/benefit assessment to evaluate the potential of reproducibility - to prepare the ground to the transfer some of the selected best practices within the Mainstreaming Programmes of the regions participating into the projectduring the current programming period 07-13 as well as in the future regional framework instruments.The main results of the project are the development of one action plan per each involved region, that provides an organized set of legal/regulatory, economical and technical / technical and best-technological proposals that–through the inclusion into the regional operation programmes, address long-term investments strategy for GCHP application at wide scale. The partnership, coordinated by the Province of Ferrara (Italy) is composed by Ministries, Regions, Local Authorities, Universities and R&D agencies of 8 Countries (Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece, Italy, Sweden, Estonia, UK and Belgium) that are dealing–at different level-with the attainment of European policy objectives in relation to 20/20/20 Kyoto targets and the EU Building Performance Directive. The partnership benefits of a strong technical background, as it capitalize experiences coming from the major EU projectsin the field of low enthalpy geothermal & technological applications, like Ground-Reach, GROUNDHIT, Ground-Med and LOW-BIN.On the basis of a pool of best practices on GCHP application developed in urban, rural and industrial sector, all partners and local delegation of experts & stakeholders go through an evaluation of the best practices reproducibility potential in each recipients region, according to technical, economical and environmental parameters, in order to design the optimum performance conditions for GCHP systems and the capacity to fit with the territorial context. The consequent preparation of the action plans and its inclusion into the Regional Operational Programmes cold represent a milestone for the future introduction of massive GCHP investments in the concerned regions. A strong communication strategy aims at increasing awareness, improving knowledge & better understanding of the GCHP merit and benefits and push investments towards such green-economy Achievements: The general objective of GEO.POWER project is to exchange Best Practices (BPs) related to low enthalpy geothermal energy supply and - after a technical and cost/benefit assessment to evaluate the potential of reproducibility - to prepare action plans for the large scale introduction of GCHP in each of the Partner regions. The GEO.POWER has been divided in 3 phases:Phase 1 regarding the review and selection of the BPs realized within GCHP sector;Phase 2 based on SWOT analysis and transferability assessment of the selected BPs into each PP region;Phase 3 consisting in the elaboration of an action plan for each involved PP to support policymakers’ commitment. Currently the project entered in its last implementation phase and on the basis of concluded SWOT analysis and assessment results, all PPs are working on their Action Plans, in strict cooperation with related Managing Authorities.The Action Plans, developed by PPs, will pave the way towards the transferability of the BPs into the Mainstreaming Programmes and energy regulations plans. These strategic documents are aimed to provide an organized set of legislative, economical, technical and marketing initiatives to address long-term investments strategy for GCHP application at wide scale, in project countries.The last two project thematic D-LABs (Development laboratories) were organized between the 2nd and 4th of May 2012, in Stockholm and Tallinn respectively. These combined workshops focused on energy performance in building policies and GCHP market development and the related environmental benefits and sustainability. Partners had the opportunity to visit the Sweden and Estonian best practices and assessed their outstanding characteristics in terms of market potential and diffusion of the geothermal energy exploitation.In the frame of the project dissemination strategy, GEO.POWER has been presented at 7th European Congress on Regional Geoscientific Cartography and Information Systems (EUREGEO), held in Bologna (Italy) on 13th June 2012. The presentation, done within the Session 3 'Subsurface Geology', focused on the common methodology run by the partnership to assess the reproducibility and transferability of some selected best practices in the target areas for advanced geothermal heat pump systems (GCHP). The conference has been an extremely useful moment to share the intermediate results with other European stakeholders.Moreover project was promoted at Energetics Fair 2012 in Celje on 16.05.2012 and Ljubljana 0n 08.03.2012, Slovenia. At PPs level GEO.POWER was promoted through the set of local forums organized in Greece, Italy,Bulgaria and Sweden.
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  • 79.4%   1 619 757,00
  • 2007 - 2013 Interreg IVC
  • Project on KEEP Platform
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