Interesting case study to develop a Life Cycle Analysis model for geothermal wells

September 2019, Delft, The Netherlands

Well Engineering Partners (WEP) participates in the Joint Interdisciplinary Project (JIP) from the TU Delft since September 2019. JIP is a new initiative started in 2018 at the TU Delft where teams with students from different backgrounds, both for knowledge-wise and cultural wise, are formed to work on a 10-week project on behalf of different companies. WEP is one of those companies that now have a full-time student team working on their behalf. The team exists of four students from different backgrounds. First, there is Sofie from the Geo-Engineering master at the TU Delft and that is also where she finished her bachelor in Civil Engineering. Second, we have Ai-Yu from the Material Science master at the TU Delft and she did her bachelor in the same field in Taiwan. The third member on the team is Jaïr, he did his bachelor at the faculty of Technology Policy and Management at the TU Delft and now follows the master Complex System Engineering and Management at the same faculty. The last team member is Mustika, she did her bachelor Engineering Physics in Indonesia and is now
following the same master program as Jaïr. These four students together form the JIP
team of WEP.

In these ten weeks, we are working on optimizing heat production from geothermal wells. This is a very general statement, so for our problem definition, we narrowed the topic down a bit. We focus on a model that can show us the influence of different material variations and decisions, using a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) of a geothermal well. This LCA will give a forecast on the possible return on investment and carbon emission from a geothermal well in the Netherlands for its total lifetime. Due to uncertainty, this model will incorporate different predictions for future scenarios related to electricity price, gas price, subsidy et cetera. Furthermore, we also look at the influence of corrosion on the well lifetime and needed maintenance period.

Within WEP we work together with our company coaches Julien, Bob and Geertjan. They help a lot with all the questions we have to improve our model. By the end of October 2019, we want to deliver a functioning LCA model, which shows the impact of different decisions on the financial aspects and carbon emissions during the whole lifetime of a geothermal well in the Netherlands.

If you would like to get in contact with us or have any suggestions relevant to our project you can contact us on WEP.JIP.Delft@gmail.com