Geothermal Power Plant on Jeju Island

The Korean Government is planning to build first geothermal power plant on Jeju Island. The plant is 5MW capacity and will be completed in 2015. About 115 billion will have been poured into the project. This geothermal plant adopts new and high technology, Enhanced Geothermal systems (EGS).

Only considering environmental aspects, in the old system, not EGS system, fluids drawn from the deep earth carry a mixture of gases, notably carbon dioxide (CO2), hydrogen sulfide (H2S), methane (CH4) and ammonia (NH3). These pollutants contribute to global warming, acid rain, and noxious smells if released. Existing geothermal electric plants emit an average of 122 kg of CO2 per megawatt-hour (MW·h) of electricity.

However, in the EGS, plants can be equipped with emission-control systems to reduce the exhaust. Furthermore plants could theoretically inject these gases back into the earth, as a form of carbon capture and storage. In the EGS system, if we don’t use hot water all the pollutant might not be emitted. Accordingly it can be regarded as clean energy.