The company acquired the Moomba Geothermal Exploration Licence 99 (GEL 99) located in the South Australian part of the Cooper Basin for a consideration of 375,000 fully paid shares in Geodynamics.

GEL 99 is the third of the first three original geothermal licences selected by the South Australian Government for competitive tender in 2000. Geodynamics already owns GEL 97 and 98 and has applied for an additional GEL of 481 square kilometres between GEL 99 and GEL 97 linking all of its exploration tenements together.

“The original licences were selected for tender because previous deep oil and gas exploration drilling had established the geothermal potential of these areas,” managing director Bertus de Graaf said.

“The insulating sediments which overlie the high heat production granites in this region have high temperature gradients of approximately 60°C per kilometre. Geodynamics now owns all of the known HFR geothermal resources in Australia, which include the hottest spot on Earth outside volcanic centres. This puts Geodynamics in a prime position as a potential future clean energy provider.”

GEL 99 covers an area of 496 square kilometres around the Moomba oil and gas processing plant and there are potential opportunities for supplying steam and/or power to this plant, according to Geodynamics.

The remoteness of the known HFR geothermal resources from the national electricity grid should not be seen as an economic handicap, de Graaf argued.

“Recent studies by expert consultants on the cost of connecting the Cooper Basin to the national grid have confirmed that costs are in the order of 0.5¢ to 1.0¢ per kWh transmitted or $5 to $10 per MWh transmitted, including the costs of transmission losses,” he said.

“The economic benefits of the known high geothermal temperatures – 280°C or more – at a depth of less than 5,000m far outweigh the relatively low cost of transmission.”