Sedimentary Geothermal Feasibility in Nevada, Western Utah, Colorado, and the Gulf Coast Region of Texas Final Report

The objectives of this project were to (1) perform a literature review of sedimentary geothermal resources, (2) identify data sources and develop data-collection methodologies that characterize selected resources, (3) screen sedimentary basins and formations for sedimentary geothermal potential, and (4) evaluate the technical feasibility of one or more selected locations.

Numerous publications have characterized geothermal resources within sedimentary basins. A literature search reviewed publications describing resources located in Colorado, Louisiana, Nevada, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming. The most attractive resources have high temperature gradients, low drilling costs, and reservoir permeabilities greater than 10 millidarcies (mD). Prospects in Colorado, Nevada, Texas, and Utah exhibit attractive characteristics and were chosen for further analysis.

Sedimentary resources in Nevada and Utah are most attractive, followed by tested resources in Texas and untested resources in Colorado. The identified resources in Wyoming and Louisiana had lower geothermal gradients and were not evaluated. Reservoir modeling and techno-economic analysis were performed at Marys River Basin - North in Nevada. Geothermal energy production at this location is expected to have a levelized cost of energy (LCOE) ranging between 10 and 20 cents/kWh. Additional work may result in lower LCOE estimates at this location and at other attractive prospects in these three regions.

Heat flow within three Colorado sedimentary basins reviewed as part of this study was calculated in targeted studies by the Colorado Geologic Survey and Colorado School of Mines. These calculations are based on bottom-hole temperature datasets with significant limitations and some variability but produce values consistently higher than the global continental average of 65 mW/m2 for all three basins. Heat flow in the Raton Basin is the highest; however, permeability measurements from specific sedimentary formations with high heat flow have not been obtained.

Promising formations for sedimentary geothermal systems were found in all three regions studied - Nevada-Utah, Colorado, and Texas.

Data e Risorse

Campo Valore
accessLevel public
bureauCode {019:20}
catalog_@context https://openei.org/data.json
catalog_@id https://openei.org/data.json
catalog_conformsTo https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
catalog_describedBy https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
dataQuality true
identifier https://data.openei.org/submissions/3863
issued 2020-07-01T06:00:00Z
landingPage https://gdr.openei.org/submissions/1225
license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
modified 2020-10-21T19:53:50Z
old-spatial {"type":"Polygon","coordinates":[[[-119.9142625,26.01754800377703],[-93.5581625,26.01754800377703],[-93.5581625,42.02828656510698],[-119.9142625,42.02828656510698],[-119.9142625,26.01754800377703]]]}
programCode {019:006}
projectLead Mike Weathers
projectNumber FY20 AOP 3131
projectTitle Sedimentary Geothermal Feasibility
publisher National Renewable Energy Laboratory
resource-type Dataset
source_datajson_identifier true
source_hash b95ac401369ab00745f0a89129b63a402b9f36ec
source_schema_version 1.1
spatial {"type":"Polygon","coordinates":[[[-119.9142625,26.01754800377703],[-93.5581625,26.01754800377703],[-93.5581625,42.02828656510698],[-119.9142625,42.02828656510698],[-119.9142625,26.01754800377703]]]}
Gruppi
  • AmeriGEOSS
  • National Provider
  • North America
Tag
  • advanced-geothermal-system
  • ags
  • amerigeo
  • amerigeoss
  • analysis
  • aquifer
  • bedrock
  • bottom-hole
  • bottom-hole-temperature
  • carbonate
  • carbonate-aquifer-unit
  • carbonate-geothermal-system
  • cgs
  • ckan
  • closed-loop
  • colorado
  • cost
  • data-mining
  • denver-basin
  • downselect
  • drilling
  • economics
  • egs
  • elko-basin
  • energy
  • enhanced-geothermal-system
  • feasibility
  • flow
  • gbcaas
  • geo
  • geology
  • geophysics
  • geoss
  • geothermal
  • gradient
  • great-basin-carbonate-and-alluvial-aquifer-system
  • gulf-coast-region
  • heat
  • hydrogeology
  • lcoe
  • lower
  • map
  • marys-river-basin
  • modeling
  • national
  • nevada
  • north-america
  • pavant-butte
  • permeability
  • piceance-basin
  • play-fairway-analysis
  • railroad-valley
  • raton-basin
  • reservoir
  • sedgeo
  • sedimentary
  • sedimentary-basin
  • seismic
  • steptoe-valley
  • structural
  • subsurface
  • techno-economic
  • temperature
  • texas
  • united-states
  • upper
  • utah
  • well-data
isopen True
license_id cc-by
license_title Creative Commons Attribution
license_url http://www.opendefinition.org/licenses/cc-by
maintainer Nicole Taverna
maintainer_email Nicole.Taverna@nrel.gov
metadata_created 2025-11-22T14:03:40.866546
metadata_modified 2025-11-22T14:03:40.866551
notes The objectives of this project were to (1) perform a literature review of sedimentary geothermal resources, (2) identify data sources and develop data-collection methodologies that characterize selected resources, (3) screen sedimentary basins and formations for sedimentary geothermal potential, and (4) evaluate the technical feasibility of one or more selected locations. Numerous publications have characterized geothermal resources within sedimentary basins. A literature search reviewed publications describing resources located in Colorado, Louisiana, Nevada, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming. The most attractive resources have high temperature gradients, low drilling costs, and reservoir permeabilities greater than 10 millidarcies (mD). Prospects in Colorado, Nevada, Texas, and Utah exhibit attractive characteristics and were chosen for further analysis. Sedimentary resources in Nevada and Utah are most attractive, followed by tested resources in Texas and untested resources in Colorado. The identified resources in Wyoming and Louisiana had lower geothermal gradients and were not evaluated. Reservoir modeling and techno-economic analysis were performed at Marys River Basin - North in Nevada. Geothermal energy production at this location is expected to have a levelized cost of energy (LCOE) ranging between 10 and 20 cents/kWh. Additional work may result in lower LCOE estimates at this location and at other attractive prospects in these three regions. Heat flow within three Colorado sedimentary basins reviewed as part of this study was calculated in targeted studies by the Colorado Geologic Survey and Colorado School of Mines. These calculations are based on bottom-hole temperature datasets with significant limitations and some variability but produce values consistently higher than the global continental average of 65 mW/m2 for all three basins. Heat flow in the Raton Basin is the highest; however, permeability measurements from specific sedimentary formations with high heat flow have not been obtained. Promising formations for sedimentary geothermal systems were found in all three regions studied - Nevada-Utah, Colorado, and Texas.
num_resources 1
num_tags 68
title Sedimentary Geothermal Feasibility in Nevada, Western Utah, Colorado, and the Gulf Coast Region of Texas Final Report