Algeria in North Africa has a strong potential in geothermal energy utilisation, based on the resources identified by the country’s Commissariat for Renewable Energies and Energy Efficiency (CEREFE) in a recent publication, as reported during an intersectoral meeting on geothermal energy in the national energy model, by the Minister of Energy Transition and Renewable Energies, Professor Chems Eddine Chitour. The meeting focused on “the contribution of geothermal energy to the current energy balance and for 2030”.

“Algeria, with more than 240 thermal springs, has a strong potential in energy resources of geothermal origin. A cartographic representation of the geothermal resources available on the national territory makes it possible to visualize and evaluate the exploitable potential of this resource”, specifies CEREFE in a publication on its facebook page, referring to data from the Algerian Atlas of Renewable Energy Resources (ENR).

The meeting reported an inventory of 240 to 280 geothermal sources and proposed different forms potential utilisation of these resources.

This atlas of the Research Center in the field of ENR (CDER) presents inventory and temperature maps of the main geothermal resources of Algeria, and also provides maps of the geothermal gradient, thermal conductivity and heat flux. , adds the same source.

“The maps presented in this atlas provide an assessment tool and decision-making aid for the exploitation of geothermal deposits available in Algeria”, maintains CEREFE.

The Commissariat also notes that the inventory of national geothermal resources is the result of work initiated by the CDER in 1985, which is based on recent data concerning thermal springs, stations, boreholes and foggaras and on new geolocation tools. .

“The main geothermal resources are classified according to temperature. The most famous of these resources is the thermal spring of Hammam Debagh (Ex-Hammam Meskhoutine). It is classified among the hottest thermal springs in the world, its temperature of water at emergence is 98 degrees C “, argues the same source.

The Commissariat explains that “geothermal energy can be exploited for the production of electricity, the heating of premises (hotels, bungalows) of geothermal stations as well as the heating of agricultural greenhouses”.

In this context, he indicated that a “pilot project was carried out by the National Office for Irrigation and Drainage (ONID) of the Ministry of Water Resources which consisted in exploiting geothermal energy from the hot water energy (60 degrees C) supplied by boreholes in the albian aquifer at the agro-industrial complex of Touggourt (wilaya of Ouargla) for heating agricultural greenhouses.

The Algerian Renewable Energy Resource Atlas can be accessed here (pdf), with the geothermal chapter on the pages 32-38.

There already is utilisation of geothermal energy for greenhouses, with large potential for more utilisation.