St. Vincent and the Grenadines Funding Geothermal Energy – First Test Wells to be drilled by July 2015 as 2018 beats Jamaica's Vision 2030

“Because if we were to get a significant amount of the monies either as grants or soft loans, the extent of the equity which they themselves have to put in, that is to say, the Emera/Reykjavik Geothermal consortium, will be reduced to that extent, and then it will obviously be reflected in the kind of pricing which you will have for the commodity at the end of the day”  

Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr Ralph Gonsalves commenting on his country plans to use Geothermal Energy for Electricity

St. Vincent is tapping into the heat energy underground.

This as Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr Ralph Gonsalves has announced plans to tap into 15MW of Geothermal Energy for usage in their power by 2018 as stated in the article “Geothermal power plant to be operational by June 2018”, published Tuesday September 2, 2014, The Jamaica Gleaner.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines began dabbling with Geothermal energy back in November 2013 when North America-based energy and services company Emera and Iceland-based Reykjavik Geothermal approached their Government as stated in “St Vincent launches geothermal energy Project”, published Sunday, November 03, 2013 2:12 PM, The Jamaica Observer.

They saw the potential in the Project and agreed to fund the exploration phase of the Project, following in the footsteps of other islands such as Dominica and Montserrat as I'd explained in my Geezam blog article entitled “Geothermal Energy in Jamaica – Steam Power from Magma Underground can cause Earthquakes and Contaminated Water”.

Geothermal Energy Funding – First Test Wells to be drilled by July 2015

Additionally, they also have been getting Grant Aid Funding or Soft Loans from Organizations and Multilateral Lending Agencies, namely:

1.      Caribbean Development Bank

2.      Government of New Zealand

3.      Japan International Corporation Agency

4.      The International Renewable Energy Agency in Abu Dhabi

Together with the St. Vincent and the Grenadines sole Electricity Utility Company, VINLEC, they did some 34 magnetotelluric and transient electromagnetic (TEM) sounding sites. More recently since August 2014, they've been doing some thermal infrared and LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) imagery using Drones in search of geothermal anomalies.

The expectation is that by July 2015, they'll start drilling some test wells as was done, to quote Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr Ralph Gonsalves: “It is expected that by June next year, a business case model will be available and drilling can commence after all contracts and the private public partnership agreements have been negotiated and agreed”.

And as Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr Ralph Gonsalves has assured St. Vincent and, no Marijuana plants were harmed in the search for Geothermal Energy, quote: “Now, I just want to say this, that very shortly, we are going to see these planes flying over. I want, in this way, to indicate to forest users that these planes are entirely innocent. ... . They are not there in search of anything else. Because as the forest users are aware, since this government has come to office, there has been no use of aircraft to address any form of agriculture in the hills”.

Geothermal Energy and the Environment – 2018 beats our Vision 2030

In order to be compliant, though, the foreigners have been playing nicely along with St. Vincent and the Grenadines Mining and Exploration Laws. They've complied by doing the following studies as well before they began boring any test wells:

1.      Infrastructure study

2.      Environmental Impact Assessment study

3.      Volcanic Risk Mitigation study

Here in Jamaica, Geologist Krishna Vaswani was also exploring Jamaica Geothermal potential since January 2013 as I'd chronicled in my blog article entitled “Geologist Krishna Vaswani to tap into 15MW of Geothermal Energy in Jamaica - Poisoned Groundwater and more Earthquakes are possible problems with Geothermal Energy”.

The risks as many including Earthquakes and Groundwater contamination as explained in my blog article above!

But given their progress, it makes me wonder if Jamaica will ever achieve our own aims of tapping Renewable Energy, seeing as Hydroelectric Power is so unreliable as explained in my blog article entitled “JPSCo says Hydroelectric down 15% - Unreliable Rainfall due to Climate Change as Solar and Wind fill 115MW Renewable Energy Contract“.

As if they succeed, they’ll beat Jamaica’s Vision 2030 targets as it relates to Renewable Energy’s contribution to the Electricity Grid.