This week, the local gas utility, Eversource, broke ground on a networked geothermal system that will connect to around 40 buildings, including low-income apartments, single-family homes, small businesses, and the neighborhood fire station. Instead of burning fossil fuels for heat, the buildings will rely on zero-emissions heat from underground, along with electricity. It’s the first pilot project of its kind run by a utility in the U.S.
I’m interested in this work because I think utility companies are often standing in the way of the shift to cheaper and cleaner renewable energy. Electric utilities at least have a clearer path towards renewables by installing solar and/or wind farms in most areas, and maybe hydroelectric or geothermal projects if conditions are right. But existing natural gas utilities usually seem to see renewables as the enemy and their executives oppose renewable energy projects in a misguided attempt to keep their “market share,” even though it’s a market that needs to end.
But if more gas utilities put their expertise to work in drilling and laying pipe for projects like these, I think there would be a good market for it and it could be the future of the utilities to create and service geothermal networks. I hope this project works, and I hope to see more of it.
Our house has oil heat, as do most in this area. (New York state, US) When we started shopping for a geothermal installer, we were surprised to find that our oil supplier also does geothermal. I guess their attitude is, “We’re losing a customer anyway, may as well get one more big payment as they leave.”
We’re in the middle of the geothermal install now, and expect it to be done before cold weather arrives. (We did not go with the oil supplier.)
Also, I suspect that they make very small margins on the oil deliveries, and make most of their margins on annual furnace maintenance and emergency repairs. So, this way they get to keep you as a maintenance and repair customer, and eventually won’t have to keep up the barely profitable fleet of tanker trucks.
It’s like the families-owned companies that have been around since the pre-electric days who used to deliver ice for refrigeration and coal for heating. Then they switched to delivering heating oil and propane, and now are adapting again.
