So you’ve been thinking about exchanging those hot incandescent lightbulbs for lower wattage compact fluorescent lamps but there’s one nagging thought you worry about: Mercury. Yes, it’s true that there is between 4-6mg of mercury per cfl. You worry, what happens if the lamp breaks? How do I recycle them post usage? Well, the good folks at Energy Trust published an informative article about these issues recently. The chart below is from their article, showing that even with the mercury in the bulb, over a 5 year burn, the CFL still results in less mercury than an incandescent bulb.

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Ormat, the largest “pure play” geothermal company in the US, yesterday announced that it would place 3 million shares on the public market. This will increase Ormat’s outstanding shares to 41.13M and effectively dilutes current shareholders by 7.8%. Unsurprisingly, the stock price dropped yesterday nearly that same percentage and seems to be creeping up incrementally today. This move should raise over $140M (less underwriter’s fees) to be used for general corporate purposes including paying down debt levels, exploration, and new geothermal plant development.

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This event is upcoming November 14-16 in San Jose. Looking at the agenda, it is geared toward educating financial types about geothermal development and geothermal developers about financing options. The details of the event are available here. There is also a one day pre-session specifically on financing activities. If you’re in the Bay Area or planning to be in the Bay Area, this could be an interesting session to attend.

Turn this…

Into this…

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Flow test of well 23-14 at Blue Mountain


Last week, Nevada Geothermal Power announced the results of the flow test for their production well, 23-14, on the Blue Mountain property. The well tested out at 10MW gross power and 7.5MW net power when pump assisted and it produced from depths of around 1,000m (~3,300 feet) at temperature of 190C (375F). Armed with this information, the development of the site should now rapidly progress enabling a plant to be operational in the foreseeable future. The last remaining hurdle is transmission, a new line will need to be constructed to deliver the power to the grid.

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As we pursue our project, we’ve found that we needed high resolution aerial imaging to kick off the process. There are many companies out there that provide these services, but we chose GlobeXplorer due to instant delivery, product selection, price, and image quality. If you’re looking for aerial photographs, give them a try.

Sample of our Sou Hills Prospect (Click to enlarge)

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