Work at Raft River EGS project underway

In Idaho, work has begun at U.S. Geothermal Inc.’s Raft River project funded by a $10 million DOE Enhanced Geothermal System grant. The team will be lead by the Energy & Geoscience Institute from The University of Utah and includes U.S. Geothermal, APEX Petroleum Engineering Services and HiPoint Reservoir Imaging. U.S. Geothermal contributed an existing phase two production well to the program for testing thermal fracturing of reservoir rock some 6,000 feet below the surface. A bridge plug was placed in well RRG-9, 2,235 feet below surface by Halliburton Energy. APEX has installed a vertical seismic profiling instrument package in the wellbore for the seismic survey. Seismic lines have been set and data acquisition is underway which will provide high resolution 2D/3D time lapse seismic reflection images of the faults and stratigraphic features in the field. The first phase of the program, which will measure the characteristics of the reservoir rock and prepare well RRG-9 for the first cold water injection, extends to the end of 2010.